The Boston Globe today weighed in on the frustration in dealing with the State Ethics Commission and all its hurdles. It is a drum we have been beating since last fall and now, hopefully, the growing calls for change will trigger action.
The Globe has run several stories over the past week-and-a-half about the lag time it takes to get Statements of Financial Interest – some of which are posted in our Full Disclosure section – that are filed by all elected state and county officials as well as thousands of appointed officials in policymaking positions. The Globe has apparently been waiting for more than a month since its reporters submitted their requests, and the stories mentioned that CommonWealth and WCVB-TV (Channel 5) have been waiting at least as long.
The fact is, we put in our initial request for the list of filers on May 6 – 111 days ago and counting – and still have not received the 336 SFIs we requested for this year. Ethics officials say the problem stems from a spike in requests – mainly from CommonWealth – and a lack of staff to process those requests.
“All SFIs have to be reviewed before they can be released because (1) the filer has to be notified of the request, and (2) we are required by the public records law to redact certain information that is required to be kept confidential,” Deirdre Roney, general counsel for the Ethics Commission, wrote to me last week when I asked what the hold-up was. “When we have an unusually large number of requests, as has been the case this year, reviewing them and making required redactions is a time consuming process.”
What Roney fails to mention is nearly 90 percent of filers submit their SFI through the electronic form on the Ethics Commission website rather than the long hand-written form which is scanned in when the ethics commission receives it. It’s hard to figure out why it’s so difficult to transfer those files to the requester.
Further slowing the process – and discouraging public requests for copies of SFI forms – is the fact that the person requesting the information has to hand over a copy of his or her identification plus $1 for each SFI, and the information is then sent to the official whose form is being requested. Massachusetts is one of only four states that have such a requirement.
“That’s no doubt convenient for political officeholders, who can keep track of who is keeping track of them,” today’s Globe editorial rightly points out.
Short-circuiting that feedback loop is the main reason we began posting SFIs on our website last year and intend to again this year and each year until the Legislature makes them available online like the 29 other states that post the information on the Internet. Citizens should not be intimidated from examining their elected representatives’ financial disclosure by the knowledge that such a request will be reported back to the official.
We have also just added the list of nearly 4,700 officials who are required by law to file a SFI. As a nonprofit with limited resources, we have had to be selective about which files we’ve picked to post online. But we would like to offer readers and subscribers a chance to help us put all SFIs online and make them available to the public free of charge. Send us the name or names of someone on the list whose SFI you think should be posted along with a check payable to MassINC for $1 for each one you’d like to see and we’ll get that SFI and post it. We will not post your name or submit it to the Ethics Commission. We will put in the request under my name.
As maddening as it is for those of us in the journalism business to jump through hoops for what are statutorily public records, the biggest losers in this are members of the general public, who are not getting timely and responsive information regarding potential conflicts from those entrusted with running their government. Full disclosure should mean that.
Send your request to:
SFI Disclosure Project
CommonWealth magazine
C/O MassINC
18 Tremont St., Ste. 1120
Boston, MA 02108
