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Capital
Notebook: Oakland Schools Review
Gongwer News Service, October 17, 2003
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The review of
travel reimbursements at Oakland Schools is continuing to leave
intermediate school district officials and Rep. Ruth Johnson
(R-Holly) butting heads. Ms. Johnson this week postponed a
subcommittee hearing on the ISD, scheduled for Monday, because
she said the district was withholding documents she had
requested.
But Interim Superintendent Dan Austin said the ISD has so far
either provided the documents Ms. Johnson requested or has not
yet reached the deadline for providing those documents.
Ms. Johnson said there were a variety of documents she had
requested under the Freedom of Information Act that had not yet
been delivered. "I ordered information from the Oakland County
ISD under the Freedom of Information Act so that committee
members and the public could have a firm understanding of what
is happening at the ISD," she said in a press release Wednesday
announcing the postponement. "Those requests have been delayed
and sometimes stonewalled."
But Mr. Austin said the district has complied with the law in
honoring all of Ms. Johnson's requests. "The FOIA requests that
we received from your office on September 26 and October 3 are
due back to you on October 20 and 24 and I assure you that we
intend to meet these deadlines," he said in a letter dated
Thursday responding to the press release. "It is my
understanding that we have provided you all the documents you
have requested with the exception of the above-mentioned pending
FOIA requests."
He said documents requested in June, including some for which
the ISD did not have a record of a FOIA request, were provided
by the statutory deadline or as quickly as possible after the
district learned of the request.
But he also argued that some of the documents requested,
specifically the purposes of some contracts, were not covered
under FOIA. "FOIA directs the responder to provide documents,
not exposition on the purpose of the documents," he said in an
attachment outlining the district's responses to Ms. Johnson's
requests.
Ms. Johnson has yet to reschedule the hearing.
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