News Flash
Judge rules that city must turn over documents.

Approximate Timeline
2006: Engineering department tells Kevin Cummins they don’t play favorites with road maintenance. They say an objective road maintenance schedule report is used and that schedule shows they are not deferring maintenance.
2007-2008: City avoids sharing roads document with Cummins.
2009: Cummins gets more serious in his request for the report. City agrees to show the report, but requires a meeting to discuss it. It turned out that the city only had a long outdated schedule that was no longer useful for the city. The city had been fibbing about basing road maintenance decisions on an objective analysis.
2009: City follows up by hiring a consultant to create an new roads maintenance schedule. The report was contracted to be complete by September 2009.
2010: From about Feb-June Cummins infrequently checks in on the status of the report. Staff was adamant that document was in draft form and they were working really hard to complete the report. Staff, claimed that because the document was draft they didn’t have to release it.
2010: March. The consultants finish their report, print it, bind it and deliver it, and get paid for a final report.
2010: June. Staff still claim the report is in draft form and continue to claim the draft document disclosure exemption.
2010: Mayor Dalager claims the city is not behind on core infrastructure maintenance during public meetings.
2010: Calaware then sends letter to city. City changes its tune and no longer claims the draft document exclusion. It now simply claims releasing the document would hurt the public’s interest in releasing the document.
2010: Tony Kranz calls the consultant and stated the consultant considered the report complete. That made it really hard for the city to continue claiming they were still working hard to finish. See below.

 

Burning Question: Does the city really accept final reports without first reading and reviewing the draft reports? There shouldn’t be anything left to review by the time the final report is issued, no? So, either the city was lying about needing to review the final report or they pay their contractors without checking their work (example).

2010: Cummins contacts Mayor Dalager asking him to help advert a lawsuit and to explain all the inconsistencies in statements and legal justifications by the city. No response.
2010: Cummins with the help of Calaware attorney, Dennis Winston, asks a Superior Court Judge to help.
2010: September. City releases a report dated March 2010, that says city is $17 million dollars behind in maintenance, which contrasts with previous and subsequent statements by Encinitas City Council Members.
2011: Calaware reports Judge Casserly has instructed the city to turn over all the remaining documents it had been keeping from the public.

See Also: For the documents and history of this case read this set of posts.