Written by From: Corman, Randy
Sent: Thursday, December 21, 2006 12:51 PM
To: ‘Julia Medzegian’; Jay Covington
Subject: Making council email more accessible to the public
Julia, Jay – Please forward appropriately for me. Thanks, Randy
______________________________________________________________________
Dear Council, Mayor, City Clerk, and City Attorney
I’m writing to let you know that effective immediately, I’ve asked
Council Liaison Julia Medzegian to process my council email in a new
and more public way. She has agreed to place hard copies of all of my
incoming and outgoing email correspondence into a notebook at her
desk, that will be available for the public to access and review.
I am confident that this change is within my authority, and will have
many positive benefits to the public. It will allow the public to
better understand the nature and volume of council email, which I
predict will reduce the number of Freedom of Information requests (and
expense associated with them.) It will also further trust in Renton’s
government, which we can never have too much of.
Perhaps this change may even be a stepping stone to an eventual
end-state where all public-official email is available and searchable
online. Since email is a public record, an on-line data base would be
welcome by many, and would help keep the public informed of government
activities on a daily basis.
Since we do not receive privileged legal information or executive
session material via email, I have not given Julia any limitations on
what she places in the file. Every email I have ever seen at city
hall seems to me to be a valid public record. And of course, the
public is so-advised on our website when they write to us.
Best Wishes to all of you for a happy holiday.
Randy
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