Cedar Hills staff, residents meet with state records official over public records dispute

Read complete KSL & Deseret News’ Sunday, June 3rd article by Ben Woods at… http://www.ksl.com/?nid=960&sid=20659224

COMMENTS from Cedar Hills Citizens for Responsible Government:

State law requires the City to maintain all city records, including emails, in the city recorder office.

The Mayor and Council have done some of the city business on city email accounts, but not all, apparently in an effort to hide business they did not want the public to see.

Why?  What have they been hiding?

For many months, the Mayor and Council have done city business on their personal accounts without providing copies to the city recorder.

These records have been GRAMA requested in behalf of Cedar Hills Citizens for Responsible Government.  At a May 18th State Record Ombudsman mediation, City officials agreed to gather and provide some email records to our representatives.  The city has refused to gather all email records (from personal accounts) unless paid to gather / organize the records, and former Council members Jim Perry, Ken Kirk, and Marisa Wright have all “declined” to provide their city email records from their personal accounts.

Why?  What were they hiding while in office?

State law requires that the city maintain a complete and accurate record that is accessible for inspect the records for free.

Utah Code 63G-2-201. Right to inspect records and receive copies of records.
(1) Every person has the right to inspect a public record free of charge, and the right to take a copy of a public record during normal working hours, subject to Sections 63G-2-203 and 63G-2-204.

If the City does not gather and provide all the records, they’ve already been paid to gather and make available, they will be required to explain themselves before the Utah State Records Committee hearing on June 15th.

For people who have “nothing to hide”, they sure do a lot of hiding.