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Teenager Wins Email Suit Against City of Kokomo
An anonymous reader writes "Recently, a 16 year old sued the city of Kokomo, Indiana for access to an email list that he suspected the mayor was mis-using for political purposes. Despite the mayor's refusal to give in, the teenager won the case. The city will have to pay not only for the expensive attorneys they hired, but may have to compensate the 16 year old's pro-bono counsel."
As I understand it, Pro-Bono means the lawyer works for free for a case they believe will win them points and get people to like them (the lawyer, that is). How do you compensate a volunteer? Or am I just totally off base here?
Slackmaster K Proprietor, DamnedNice Blog
So he successfully sued the city to give him the email adresses of all people that are on some city mailing list?
So any Spammer can now just request these lists to get free verified addresses?
How is that in the public interest? What laws are the basis for this?
So that why I still get those dang FOP solicitation calls every year. I wonder how the FOP got the no-call list from the state anyway, since they didn't have to follow it in the first place?
Frankly, I'm surprised the city tried to contest this at all.
Aside from the Freedom of Information Act, I could think of a ton of good reasons why this kid should get this or why anyone should be able to get a list like this. Whatever happened to the good old days where we were encouraged to snail mail every single person representing us in office?
When I was younger, I was pretty dissatisfied with the insane food prices at my high school. Even worse was the fact that my parents were making me pay for my own food. So I threatened the school with the Freedom of Information Act and demanded to see all food related reciepts and documents including pay and taxes. They gave me two huge boxes full of crap and I spent one night sorting through everything. And, surprisingly enough, after I sorted through and found out how much they were paying Arrowmark or whoever the food service provider was--it just didn't make sense. The local grocery store had better prices.
My work here is dung.
Those revelations will only come as a suprise to those who do not live in or near kokomo. Having lived in the state of Indiana for a few years longer than I would have liked, I cant see anything here that the local populace wouldnt VOLUNTARILY elect into a public office. The 'small town' life has many, MANY, many dark secrets to it. As far as I can see, this mayor is simply a mirror of the populace he represents.
Piece of advice, MOVE! Until you remove yourself from that atmosphere for an extended amount of time, you wont understand how much it is dragging you down.
Ok, ok, I didn't think the result was really that important but ...
I was working with three other guys to try and figure out what suggestions to make. And also let me say that this was a high school (not a gradeschool) and there were some insanely pricey healthy foods but super cheap candy and twinkies as you went up to the cash register.
We contacted Hy-Vee (our local grocery store) and asked them how difficult (and how expensive) it would be to make regular shipments of real fruit and real food to the cafeteria. It turned out to be quite a bit cheaper than shipping it 3 hours from the nearest metropolis--imagine that!
So when we approached them with this idea, they said it wasn't that simple. That they had contracts with their distributor and they couldn't break them--which was strange because they could bring in Dominos pizza every friday.
So, in the end, they made token price adjustments on the foods to make everyone happy. A nickel here, a dime there. But the prices kept going up until they were eventually were higher than they were before. They blame that on inflation. Then I graduated and just kind of accepted that crap like that happens in hick towns like the one where I grew up.
My work here is dung.
Wow! So let me get this straight. Trying to protect the citizens is something to attack the mayor on, right?
First of all, the prayer chapel had been there when the medical facilities was opened. It is part of a Catholic owned hospital chain. Two, there are two other churches within reach.
He is trying to promote family instead of a "get married, if it doesn't work out, who cares?" attitude, since the divorce rate in Kokomo is approx. 50%.
The public meetings? He did so in accordance to law. Those meetings were suppose to be closed.
Maybe those "top campaign" contributers are the most qualified? Oh, and EVERY policitian does that. To take it one step further though, he went through interview processes. He called individuals he trusted for adivce, including my father who is NOT a political figure and who is not wealthy and/or a major campaign contributor. He even asked him if he would like to apply for a position because Mr. McKillip felt he would be appropriate for the position.
The city did not sue. Mr. Nees sued the city. The city had no choice but to go to court.
Now...as far as being the worst mayor. He saved the tax payers $50 mill is first year in office, correct? I also had a top official tell me from before the Mayor even considered running for political office, "If I would have known what shape this city was in when I took this job, I would have brought my coloring books and crayons to the office." That pretty well tells the state of the city before Mr. McKillip was in office.
As for the list, Mr. Nees cannot verify that the list is separate from his campaign list. First, Mr. McKillip does keep two lists. Yes, the addresses on the campaign list are on the city list, but NOT vice versa. I receive two mailings from Mr. McKillip: one from his campaign email that has to do with non-city business and one from the city that has to do with city business. It has been this way since he was in office. Mr. McKillip does not have to give out the campaign list. So how Mr. Nees can compare the two, I'd like to know.
Now, on a personal note. I use to work for Mr. McKillip. He has always been honest and straight forward. Those that accuse him of lying, obviously do not know him. He is has always been willing to give the information that is necessary. He has always taken care of all of his employees beyond what was necessary. In no other job did I receive as much respect, encouragement, and support from my boss. To say that he is a liar, is saying that the office corrupted him. I can still email him and call him and he is always straight up with me. Granted, there are things that he cannot say until the appropriate time, but that does not make him a liar.
So all that being said, yes, he is a human. He does make mistakes. He won't be able to make the popular decision all the time. That is part of being a political figure. Unfortunately, people are unwilling to seek out the truth. It is always the other guys fault.
Maybe he is the worst mayor in Kokomo's history. Maybe he is too honest to be a politician. Maybe he shouldn't put the public first. Take the time to know someone before attacking that person. You might be surprised at what you find...