Finance Committee Page 22
August 3, 2016
Finance Committee. This is essentially what we talked about with some changes from the prior discussion.
There’s no mention of going into non-public session. It is not a requirement of the finance committee to go into
non-public session. It is always the choice of the committee members to go into non-public or not. Members
always have the option of querying the police department directly on their own to find some clarification. If that
were the case and this were to come before the Board and there was a discussion, one wouldn’t have to go
into non-public session to say | talked to the Chief, or whoever, got some clarification. |’m comfortable without
releasing any information. There was also a discussion | had with Attorney Clarke regarding the specific
elements of the Right-to-Know law and how they would apply in this case. The Right-to-Know law is actually
not well drafted. This seems like an obvious case to us. It’s very clear that the lives of police officers would be
in jeopardy should this information be revealed. However, the Right-to-Know law isn’t entirely clear on this.
We're relying on the notion of impugning the integrity of an individual or the reputation of an individual. In this
particular case, a police officer, whether in this department or some other, who has a reputation of being a drug
dealer to reveal this information would in fact impugn their reputation which is a carefully crafted reputation to
serve a particular purpose. That is sort of the theory by which we can apply this. It’s a shame that the
common sense portion of this, which is we don’t want people to get killed because information was revealed, is
actually not part of the existing legislation. | would urge my colleague, Alderman O’Brien, a member of the
state legislature to look into plugging such a potential hole so we don’t get into a conflict about this. | doubt
any of us would reveal the name of a police officer because we were afraid of a Right-to-Know suit, but | just
wanted to point that out for completeness sake. That was part of the discussion. That was the changes, and
we don’t have any “etc.” in here that allow for a truck to be driven through this. It’s very explicit. That’s why the
changes were made.
Alderman Wilshire
I’m happy with the amendments; | think they work. | think they accomplish what we set out to accomplish.
Thank you for that, Alderman Siegel.
MOTION CARRIED
DISCUSSION
RECORD OF EXPENDITURES
MOTION BY ALDERMAN SIEGEL THAT THE FINANCE COMMITTEE HAS COMPLIED WITH THE CITY
CHARTER AND ORDINANCES PERTAINING TO THE RECORD OF EXPENDITURES FOR THE PERIOD
JULY 15, 2016 TO JULY 28, 2016
MOTION CARRIED
PUBLIC COMMENT
POSSIBLE NON-PUBLIC SESSION
ADJOURNMENT
MOTION BY ALDERMAN SIEGEL TO ADJOURN
MOTION CARRIED
The Finance Committee meeting was adjourned at 8:32 p.m.
Alderman Ken Siegel
Committee Clerk
