Education
Cleveland County School admin says Public Records Requests aren’t considered as urgent
It’s interesting to see that in May, the attorney and Dr. Shull claimed that there was a flash drive available and all the work:
You’re saying now that staff has already done the work to compile the requested information and spent 3 hours doing so, and there will be a charge now? Those charges were not made clear upfront, or before the work was performed. It does not seem reasonable to ask for a service payment now to cover retrospective work. If I had been made aware of potential fees (as indicated when I submitted the request), then I would have considered this back in February and asked you not to proceed.
I’m sorry that staff has already spent the time to compile this request, but at this point since I was not notified of any charges, then I would expect that any fees would be waived in this case and you will simply mail the flash drive.
Now, in November, they cry about the hardship of a pregnant attorney who now has a 4 month old baby, so her work is now limited (except for ethics violations and such)
Notice on the top of this page, and Dr. Greg Shull’s response:
While we understand that this request was initially received on 2/17/23, it was not until mid-June that we received confirmation that you would like us to proceed with fulfilling your request due to the special service charge. See N.C.G.S. 132-6.2(b) (a fee may be charged to the requestor for extensive use of information technology resources and labor – such was the case here to put the requested information in redactable and readable format).
Our legal counsel was able to review and redact approximately 20% of the documents before the birth of her daughter in late June. After the birth of her child, Ms. Sink worked a reduced schedule where only the most pressing issues were tended to. Her baby just turned 4 months old this past Friday, and Ms. Sink has returned to a regular schedule this week.
Even though many of the 3200 emails are duplicates, the redaction process must still be complete for each document. At a rate of approximately 1 minute of review per document, it is estimated that the redaction project will take 53 hours to complete. As mentioned above, approximately 20% of the project is complete – leaving an estimated 42 hours of work. With a goal of dedicating 30 minutes a day to this project, excluding weekends and major holidays, our anticipated completion date is March 1, 2024.
Yet, they had time to hold a special meeting, with a very pregnant attorney present, appearing to have no problems in this meeting that saw the board chair+ 5 put a screw job on Danny Blanton and Ronnie Grigg. She had time to sit through all the mess as the board chair+ 5 lauded the Principal of Burns High, and cast the blame on the 2 board members and railroaded them on an ethics violation. See for yourself!
Yea, let’s hear it for transparency!
[Ed: In the subtitle, we stated the date as 2025 when the info would be available. Regretfully, that was a typo and should have been 2024.]
