Two watchdog groups filed a lawsuit Monday asking that a court order five Republican state lawmakers to turn over email messages concerning the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, which were sent and received using personal email accounts.
The Madison-based Center for Media and Democracy and Common Cause, both national organizations, wrote in the lawsuit filed in Dane County Circuit Court that the legislators' offices have refused to comply with open records requests the two groups made for any ALEC-related emails on legislators' personal email accounts.
ALEC is a national organization of state legislators and private supporters, nearly all Republican, that proposes and provides "model legislation" for lawmakers in statehouses throughout the country.
The lawsuit says that the groups reminded the legislators that Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen's open records compliance guide states that email that conducts government business that is sent or received on the personal email account of an authority such as a legislator constitutes a record. The state Supreme Court has also ruled that government business conducted on personal email accounts is an open record.
According to the lawsuit, the office of at least one of the legislators, Rep. Jeremy Thiesfeldt, R-Fond du Lac, has directed that any ALEC-related material be sent to Thiesfeldt's personal email address and not his government email address.
Another of the legislators, Rep. Tyler August, R-Walworth, provided only his personal email address as a contact, according to ALEC Education Task Force documents, the lawsuit states.
"Defendants apparently believe they can evade the Open Records Law by shifting those same correspondences to a personal email account," the lawsuit states.
The lawsuit estimates that 32 bills or budget provisions introduced in the 2011-12 legislative session resembled ALEC "model" legislation.
No comments:
Post a Comment