By ANTHONY BOTTAN
According to the proposed amendment, drafted by Mayor Brian Curran and Village Attorney Peter Ledwith, the mayor would not have to file a Freedom of Information request for village information. Ledwith said that by law, the mayor is charged with running the day-to-day operations of the village, and must always have ready access to such information. But a trustee, Ledwith said, is nothing more than a regular citizen, in legal terms, if he or she is not acting at the direction of the board, and must file a request under the Freedom of Information Law, or FOIL, for village information.
"The beauty of FOIL is that there are certain procedures the village must follow," Ledwith said. "It's guaranteed information. I think this is a good idea, and would only pop up about one out of a hundred times."
The proposed amendment states that board members' FOIL requests must be submitted to Village Administrator John Giordano. According to state law, requests must either be granted or denied within five business days.
Ledwith explained that an "extraordinary amount of time" varies depending on the situation. A full day of work by village staffers to gather information might fit that definition, as might a half-hour during tax season, when employees are unusually busy.
According to Ledwith, information has been routinely passed along to board members rather casually: Trustees simply asked for it. Ledwith added that some trustees ask for a great deal of information several times a month, and a rule needed to be put in place to limit the amount of time devoted to searching for it.
Neighboring municipalities, like Valley Stream, East Rockaway and Rockville Centre, do not require trustees to file Freedom of Information requests for village information. Valley Stream Clerk Vinny Ang said that the only circumstances in which such a request would be necessary would be if it dealt with personnel records. East Rockaway Mayor Ed Sieban said his village board members are given full access to any information they want, as did Rockville Centre Mayor Mary Bossart.
Lynbrook Trustee David Penso said he views the proposed amendment as a way to block trustees from gathering information. "This is just another ridiculous measure by the mayor and village attorney," Penso said. "There has never been an abuse of my privilege as trustee in asking for information in a timely manner."
Penso added that he thinks there must be a reason - one that he does not know - why Curran wanted to amend the board's operating procedures. "Before, if a board member wanted information, they would ask and get it," Penso said. "We're not talking about personnel records. We're talking about village business and money spent on projects. The mayor has never presented to the board the reason for change. You start to change course in the middle of the stream when you don't want something to get found out."
Curran did not return several calls for comment.
Trustee Richard Clifford agreed with Penso. "Possibly, the mayor is trying to make this a Federalist type of government," Clifford said. "This [amendment] is made to muffle trustees - to prevent information from being divulged that certain people don't want divulged."
Robin Charlow, a professor of constitutional and criminal law at Hofstra University, said that if the amendment is passed, it could create a legal problem because of the subjective nature of defining an "extraordinary amount of time." "The person who would be administering the law would have a great deal of subjective leeway to interpret that law as wished, and that could create a problem," Charlow said.
The proposed amendment was tabled at the board's Sept. 15 meeting, and will be taken up at the next scheduled meeting on Oct. 6 at 7 p.m.
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