January 16, 2015
Groton school officials block release of data in hazing case
GROTON — School district officials recently denied a parent’s requests for details of an investigation on the hazing incident that rattled the district, a denial which possibly violates the state Freedom of Information Law, according to the state Committee on Open Government.
The school district denied the Jan. 5 request by Mike Lockwood, the parent of a football player and former board of education member. He was seeking copies of paper and electronic records regarding an outside investigation of district coaches, including how many coaches were investigated.
Another request submitted by Lockwood the same day sought copies of paper and electronic communications between former Superintendent of Schools James Abrams, Athletic Director Billie Downs, former Varsity Head Football Coach Jeff Lewis and Assistant Coach Bobby Brull. This request was also denied on Jan. 7.
Downs is the only one of those school officials still employed by the district following the incident.
Abrams resigned and Lewis and Brull were notrehired.
The district has been in turmoil since a Sept. 10 incident in the boys’ locker room that reportedly involved a football player rubbing his genitals on another student’s face. The incident led to two football players pleading guilty to first-degree harassment, a misdemeanor.
The district refused to release any documents on the grounds the documents were confidential.
A state expert on the Freedom of Information Law says the denials were too broad since the exceptions to the law are narrow in focus.
Lockwood’s request for information on the investigation of coaches was prompted by Abrams’ Sept. 29 announcement that the district would hire a consultant to examine district staff actions. The consultant would determine if staff complied with state law requiring incidents of discrimination and harassment be reported.
The investigator filed a report of findings with the district. The district was advised by its law firm to deny Lockwood’s request since it involved “interagency or intra-agency communications,” District Clerk and Records Management Officer Lisa Warmbrodt said in a phone interview Thursday.
The district has hired the Hogan, Sarzynski, Lynch, Dewind & Gregory law firm of Johnson City.
Robert Freeman, executive director of the Committee on Open Government, said Monday that the district’s denial was too broad.
Freeman said there should be portions of the internal communications and communications between public agencies that can released.
Public agencies are required to thoroughly review their records and if any portion can be released, it must be released, he said. For example, portions of communications that include instructions to staff that affect the public or statements of polices must be released.
Additionally, if an agency confirmed an employee committed wrongdoing and the employee was disciplined, that information would be public, he said.
It is also unlikely that all of the communications between the administrators and coaches asked for in Lockwood’s second request fall into the FOIL confidentiality exemption, Freeman said.
If the district denied the request because of federal privacy requirements, the district should have noted that in its denial, he said.
The denial does not elaborate why releasing the documents was deemed a “confidential disclosure.”
After sending the FOIL request to the district’s lawyer, district officials were instructed to deny the request because of “confidential disclosure,” Warmbrodt said, adding she could not know why it was to be marked confidential.
Lockwood said in a phone interview he plans to appeal the decision.
The district has become “very secretive,” Lockwood said, pointing to an unannounced and possibly illegal recent board of education meeting Jan. 2, an audit by the state comptroller and the FOIL requests.
The state audit found district residents were overtaxed by $509,000 and the district did not use any of the $2.6 million of savings it had planned to use from 2011 to June 30, 2014.
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