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City Gets More Time to File Objections in Open Records Suit
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio -- The city of Youngstown has been granted an additional 60 days to object to a court's finding that the city violated open records laws and that it must pay legal fees incurred by The Business Journal resulting from the suit it filed more than a year ago.Mahoning County Common Pleas Magistrate Eugene Fehr gave the city until March 7 to file written objections to his ruling of Dec. 22. Under Ohio law, written objections to the magistrate's decision are due 14 days after the judgment is filed.While the ruling was issued Dec. 22, the city pointed out, the decision wasn't mailed until Dec. 28 and not received by the city's counsel, Cleveland attorney Craig Miller, until Dec. 29. The city's motion noted the six-day delay in serving the decision, the limited business hours because of the New Year's holiday and its need to obtain a copy of the court transcripts so it could review the factual basis of the case. These factors justified the request for more time, the city argued.On Oct. 31, 2003, The Business Journal sued the city, Mayor George McKelvey and then Law Director John McNally IV, saying city officials violated Ohio's open records laws by intentionally withholding documents the newspaper requested that related to the Youngstown Convocation Center project.Beginning in February 2003, The Business Journal made a series of public records requests related to the purchase and development of a 26-acre parcel for which the city paid $1.5 million so it could construct what is to be a $41 million convocation center.The court heard three days of testimony in January and February 2004.On Dec. 20, Fehr ruled the city failed to produce documents the paper clearly requested and singled out McKelvey as exhibiting "ill-will" by his instructing city officials not to discuss any official business with the newspaper. Fehr concluded McKelvey's actions, "had a chilling effect upon the free exchange of information between city officials and The Youngstown Business Journal so necessary in a democratic society."McKelvey took the opportunity at a Board of Control meeting Thursday morning to reiterate his position on open records to his newly appointed law director, Iris Guglucello. McNally resigned to become a Mahoning County commissioner Jan. 3."My philosophy and my policy as mayor on public records is public records belong to the public -- period," the mayor said. "Give the media anything they want as quickly as you can possibly give it to them."Should she determine a legal exception to any open-records request exists, he told Guglucello, then as law director that is a decision that she, not the mayor, must make.McKelvey stressed that this has been his philosophy since he became mayor seven years ago and which was to be followed by Guglucello's predecessors, Robert Bush and John McNally, "as is reflected in the record of a recent court case numerous times as testified by city employees and city officials.""