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Attorney Explains Why Public Records Request Not Fulfilled Nine Months Ago
September 23, 2009
A Century Town Council member says that he never received public records formally requested nine months ago, but the town’s lawyer says he thought the issue was actually settled a few days after the request.
Attorney Explains Why Public Records Request Not Fulfilled Nine Months Ago
In his December letter addressed to Mayor Freddie McCall, Councilman Henry Hawkins requested a certified copy of all documents related to Georges Van Nevel, Helicopter Technologies, Inc., and Van Nevel Helicopters, including financial journals; all correspondence and documents between the parties, including emails; and copies of all legal pleadings and briefs between the town and its legal counsel. Hawkins asked that the information be provided to him within 14 days.
The 14 days has been over…months ago,” Hawkins told his fellow council members at a September 8 meeting. “Y’all can do what you want to do, and I am going to do what I have to do.”
The town’s attorney, Matt Dannheisser, said the certified mail letter dated December 10, 2008, was not actually received by the town until December 24. Dannheisser said the letter was faxed to his office on December 30.
According to a September 11 letter to the Century council, McCall then called Danneheisser’s office to determine if the town could charge Hawkins for the records due to the “large number of documents” that “would require staff of the Town a significant amount of time to locate and prepare copies”.
“I suggested to Mayor McCall that the simplest and least expensive approach would be to have Mr. Hawkins review my files and identify what portions he desired copies,” said Dannheisser, adding that his records as the town’s attorney contain most, if not all, of the information requested by the council member.
Dannheisser wrote that he contacted Hawkins on December 30 and advised that he could produce the requested records in a matter of minutes for Hawkin’s inspection. He said that the files are “approximately nine to ten inches thick” could be copied in the range of $100 to $150.
“Mr. Hawkins agreed that my proposal would be far more expedient for all concerned and indicated that he would get back in touch with me to arrange a time to review my files,” Dannheisser wrote in his letter to the council. “I was under the impression that Mr. Hawkins was going to discuss this matter with someone else and perhaps bring another person with him to review the files.”
After his December 30 conversation with Hawkins, Dannheisser said he called the mayor and relayed what was said.
“I had understood, perhaps mistakenly, that it was not necessary for Town staff to locate and copy the requested records from Mr. Hawkins, rather he would first inspect my files before deciding whether such efforts would be necessary,” the attorney wrote. “I relayed that understanding to Mayor McCall, which I suspect explains why no further efforts were undertaken by Town staff to fill Mr. Hawkins’ public records request.”
Click here to read the September 11 letter from Town Attorney Matt Dannheisser (pdf).
Comments
22 Responses to “Attorney Explains Why Public Records Request Not Fulfilled Nine Months Ago”
If the things Mr. Hawkin did was for the betterment of the town it would be okay, but he only does the things he does to try to look good. Look at me I am the only one concerned about the towns welfare (what a crock) I dare say some of these people who write comments have never been to a council meeting. If you think it is so easy sitting on the council well why don’t you try sitting there making decisions and have everyone complaining. They are in a situation where excuse the expression they are damned if they do and damned if they don’t.. Century doesn’t have enough money for me to be low rated like they are.
REGARDING:
“Why would a business want to move to Century ”
Highly skilled, honest, intellegent, appreciative work force
Easy access to rail and interstate transportation system
Cheap land-relatively speaking
Friendly people
Entertaining government
Recreationatinal opportunities-fishing, hunting, cock fighting–naw just joking there
Lack of much snow or hurricanes
Friendly regulatory situation
Tax benefits
No hassle by police-ain’t got none
or so it seems to me
Why would a business want to move to Century I believe that the town council and the citizens are always at each other throat. I would not bring in a business to Century the way the people that run the town get along. along with the people that are not council that try to run the town. This is bad for business. Ann Brooks is the only one that seems to knows what to do. Maybe she should run for mayor again.
REGARDING:
“Councilman’s it really sounds like someone is wanting some of your jobs or they are fixing to run for one of the seats.”
Well, they ARE great jobs, not much pay, not much respect, lots of folks calling you names……, what am I saying?… what sane person would fight for the job?
Actually, they are the kinds of jobs people take out of a sense of duty to their fellow citizens. Even if they don’t agree where their duties lie, they are worthy of respect for wanting to make things better.
Some people think you make things better by sweeping dirt under the rug. Others think you make things better by holding them up to the light of day, under the theory others will be less likely to deal in dirt later and to show there was no dirty dealing before.
I could be wrong, but it seems to me the simplest thing would have been for any interested party to ask to see the existing records rather than needing some unspecified copies.
Failing that, to say, “Yes, I agree to pay the $150 cost so I can have it my way.”
or so it seems to me
To Century Girl That Knows, sounds like you work in City Hall or someone is feeding you information so they will question what is really going on. It sounds like you have the answer’s. So why don’t you tell Hawkins what he needs to know. I don’t even live around there but this is really got my curiosity up. It is really bad that the Town people have to put up with something like this. Councilman’s it really sounds like someone is wanting some of your jobs or they are fixing to run for one of the seats.
It does not matter who wants the papers — they should be turned over. He can look at the them for free, but he needs to pay for copies. That’s only fair.
It’s not the stuff at the lawyer’s office he needs to look at. That’s all too clean. It’s the records at city hall. The phone call logs, phone bills, emails and other stuff. The emails are very important.
I don’t have to make him look bad he does it by himself
Ok jessie28, you just answer my question, there really is someone else that wants those papers. Get over it and move on. The pot has been stir long enough. Let the Town get on with there business.
no matter the situation of why the papers were never produced, the van nevel soga needs to be investigated. PERIOD
jessie28, did you not read the ( pdf ) file. How hard is that to understand. Hawkins drop it himself when he didn’t get back with the Lawyer. And now he brings this back up. Sounds like he wants to start trouble now because of his on lack of judgment by not getting back in touch with the Lawyer. Are is there really someone else that really wants these papers ? It is statements like yours that is embarrassing to the Town. It really makes Hawkins look bad.
I can’t understand why hawkins is still on the council he is against everything the town tries to do, they should get rid of him as soon as possible and get someone that is that will help Century not tear it down
so overall, you guys think the situation with van nevel should just be forgotten. No look at all the mistakes that were made and what the cause was…. this town has many problems and they are almost NEVER resolved. the big issues are always swept under the rug for one reason or another. It’s a circus.
I would like for someone (anyone) to post a MAJOR issue that was resolved in this town . The town meetings are a complete waste of time and useless… This is very embarrasing.
jessie28 can’t you see if Hawkins wanted the papers that bad he would have follow up on it instead, Mr. Hawkins agreed that the Lawyer’s proposal would be far more expedient for all concerned and indicated that he would get back in touch with the Town Lawyer to arrange a time to review the Lawyer’s files. The Lawyer was under the impression that Hawkins was going to discuss the matter with someone else and perhaps bring another person with him to review the files, but Hawkins never got back in touch. If he wanted them that BAD why didn’t he set a time with the Lawyer to get what he wanted. Not just wait around and twiddling his thumbs, if you feel something is that important move on it, don’t just sat back and wait Months down the road.
Mr. Van Nevel is gone and over. Lets move on Mr. Hawkins and help run this Town and quit digging up bones. Ther are more constructive things you can put your time and efforts in now in doing your No. 1 job for this Town and that is simply passing and/or declining on issues that pass before the council table. Let the Mayor do his job and run the Town. Most of this STUFF happen when Mayor McCall was a council member himself. All you and the rest of the council have to do is simply ‘BE A COUNCIL’.
You Know I cant answer that question but I can say that even when all of this was going on and Van Nevel was costing this town big dollars month after month for years, Henry Hawkins was the ONLY one who seemed HIGHLY concerned. He Exspressed his concern many many times and NO one listened.. NO one.. Most people thought it was personal and it could have been.. But the reason it became personal was because Van Nevel was putting the town in serious debt and Hawkins was the only one want to get him out of here…McCall wanted to continue to give this guy a chance and allow him to get deeper and deeper…. The town was warned by the FAA, BBB, Government, Van NEvel’s own employees and our own community leader Henery Hawkins…. The town would not hear !!!!! Van Nevel would come to town meetings and make a spectical out of it and then laugh about it………He should have never been able to go that far in debt with the town….The town will cut off the water to a disabled ederly person over $60.00 who has been a honest productive town citizen for 40 years but they would allow this guy (who moved to Century because he cause the same problem in cotton Dale) who is basically a crook and done NOthing for the town, they would allow him to go in debt for hundreds of thousands of dollars for months and months over and over again???????WHY??????Yes I have a problem with this and so does Hawkins and so should you and every other person… There is a reason why this was allowed to happen…. I will Personally help Hawkins pay for the docs…. This is information that needs to be out there… . ONce again I dont know why the other members dont want to veiw the docs and I surely dont understand why Henery Hawkins was the only one wanting something done back then… You can call it personal and I will call it SHADY!!!
I’m sure you are right, jessie28. But they are allowed to charge him for the copies up to $1 per page under Florida law. If he wants hundreds of pages, he should pay. The town would not be good stewards to provide him with hundreds of dollars of something for free. Might even be an ethics violation.
A better question might be — why are the other four council members not asking to see the documents? If the whole council voted to see them, they would all get them for free.
Don’t the other four want to see the documents?
MR. Hawkins is not beating a dead horse. Mr. Hawkins is trying to uncover a mess that should have never happen. Georges Van Nevel and Helicopter Technologies cost the town of Century a lot of money and time for years. How this man was able to get away with not paying the town for months and months, over and over again is just absolutely mind blowing!!!!!!!! This man went months and months even close to a year in debt to the town of Century to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars and no one seemed to be in any hurry to collect( Mayor McCall gave him chance after chance to get right and Van Nevel had NO intentions of squaring up! I personally told McCall this). But yet the town is worried so much about having $100 worth of copies made to get to the bottom of this?????? Yea RIGHT (I hope town people are not this Naive)!!! There IS a lot more to this story and Mr. Hawkins Knows this as well as I do. There is information to be uncovered and certain people know this too!!!!!! Certain people do NOT want this revealed because of the problems it could and will cause. This $100.00 is not going to bankrupt the town and This is very important information that the citizens of Century should be aware of….I would be willing to bet anything that I own that when Mr. Hawkins puts his hands on these doc’s, The true concerned tax payers of this small town is going to be Quite unhappy to say the least. Mr. Hawkins, Great work and please do not give up on this…. I know that what you are doing is protecting our tax dollars and it will pay off in the long run for both the town and our people… Thanks
Guys Please open your Eye’s Trust Hawkins on this one.
I agree with “opinion” if what the lawyer said is not him covered the town’s behind. But we all know lawyers. If they/their client get a certified/registered letter, is an attorney going to respond on the phone with their “final offer”? Or are they going to send back a certified/registered letter? That’s what stinks about this one. The attorney should have responded with a certified/registered letter. I can’t imagine a lawyer responding with a phone call to a legal certified/registered request that could send someont to jail or get them fined.
The more you think about it, the more it seems they swept it under the rug hoping it would go away. And the more it sounds like they don’t want Rev. Hawkins to see what records the town has. Look at the lawyer records, but don’t look at all those emails that went back and forth between the mayor and Van Nevel. Secret dealings?
After reading the (pdf file) sounds like to me Hawkins owe’s the Century Town Council a huge apology.
“Mr. Hawkins was going to discuss this matter with someone else and perhaps bring another person with him to review the files”
Hmmm….wonder who that could be? Maybe someone that financed his campaign?
Quit wasting our time, Mr. Hawkins, and making Century look bad.
“Mr. Hawkins agreed that my proposal would be far more expedient for all concerned and indicated that he would get back in touch with me to arrange a time to review my files,” Dannheisser wrote in his letter to the council.
Mr. Hawkins knew that he had talked-or corresponded with the attorney about the records and if he wanted to see them he would get them all from him, WHY lie and try to make to town look bad? It’s his own fault he doesn’t have the records. Quit trying to make trouble Mr. Hawkins, we are tired of it!
Well, did the town attorney actually offer the review option, Mr. Hawkins? If so, what’s your beef? Because if this is the case, it sounds like there was some additional effort on your part in this attempt to save you from having to pay a large fee. For the town, this is typical as no good deed goes unpunished and now it’ll have to face the consequences of trying to help someone. Next time the town should do exactly as requested and not worry about the cost for the requestor.