The Llano Ledger
Newsletter Text V62
This Website Is Full. Starting With The December 25, 2000 Newsletter,
All Future Editions Will Be Posted In The Llano Ledger 2, Found By
Clicking http://maxpages.com/llanoledger2.
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Publisher's Note: Since the October 23, 2000 Newsletter will be long
and involved, posting has begun early. Be sure to read the current
October 16, 2000 edition on Newsletter Text V61. This website is over
90% full. To conserve space, the Lawson Deposition is continued on The
Llano Ledger 2 and can be found by clicking
http://maxpages.com/llanoledger2. T.C. October 17, 2000.
*************October 23, 2000************
Readers will recall LMHS Administrator/CEO Ernie Parisi was asked
for access to Hospital pager records for employees "not on call" in an
Open Records Request dated September 21, 2000. Not surprisingly, Mr.
Parisi feigned confusion about the phrase. The Administrator, however,
knows damn well doctors are frequently "on call". So may x-ray or
operating room technicians, etc.. Others, such as administrators,
secretaries, clerical help are not. ... Highly unlikely, Ole' Ernie
would be disturbed while getting his beauty sleep, no?
All joking aside, the records were sought to get a snapshot of
waste. While physicians and other medical staff have to be available at
a moment's notice, there are numerous Hospital employees who do not
need pagers. While the Administrator's quibbling was initially thought
to be merely nonsense for the sake of nonsense, examination of the
released material indicates more. Parisi, apparently, feigned confusion
because the record-keeping, putting it mildly, stinks. The latest HCI
Highland Digital Paging inventory sheet dated June 7, 2000 contained 96
pagers, some listing the same number twice.
Quite possibly, Ole' Ernie himself doesn't know who should and
shouldn't have a pager. Many are not assigned to an individual
employee, but to a department. With records so poorly managed, how can
anyone reasonably assess whether funds have been well-spent? ... If you
can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bulls--t, right
Ernie?
Consider the following monthly charges for calendar year 2000:
Aug. 24, 2000 $925.52
Jul. 23, 2000 $724.43
June 21, 2000 $609.62
May 23, 2000 $956.14
Apr. 26, 2000 $657.12
Mar. 23, 2000 $797.23
Feb. 23, 2000 $576.46
Jan. 24, 2000 $597.18
My apologies for the unsightly table. -- The software will not
allow any better display. Figures for earlier years were similar.
Although a drop in the bucket regarding LMHS expenditures, this is
clearly one area that should have been closely scrutinized by Hospital
officials as to necessity. ... Were all the pagers assigned warranted?
To her credit, Chief Financial Officer Mindy Smith, however, apparently
challenged some of the billings. With record-keeping egregiously
sloppy, it must have been quite difficult to know what was and was not
appropriately charged.
The following letter was received from the General Services Commission, Thursday, October 19, 2000:
General Services Commission
1711 San Jacinto
P.O. Box 13047
Austin, Tx. 78711-3047
Via Certified Mail-#Z078181048RRR
October 18, 2000
Mr. Jack Patton
Superintendent
Llano Independent School District
200 E. Lampasas
Llano, TX 78643
RE: COMPLAINT OF OVERCHARGES-TIM CHORNEY
Dear Mr. Patton:
Thank you for your letter of September 11, 2000.
You have provided me with copies of the statements sent to Mr.
Chorney. The statements show the itemized charges for Mr. Chorney's
requests. You have not, however, provided me with copies of Mr.
Chorney's responses to your itemized statements.
Following is a chronology based on the documents I have in my possession:
April 15 - Mr. Chorney requested information regarding the
District. The request was in the form of an Interrogatory, and did not
request either access or copies of documents.
April 28 - You sent Mr. Chorney a statement for $105.90 for 84
copies and several hours of personnel time, which you called
"research." Under the Public Information Act, the District was not
required to provide answers to general inquiries. (See ORD-555,
attached) I conclude then that the District did so of its own choice;
therefore, no charges can be assessed. Additionally, it appears that
the statement sent to Mr. Chorney was a bill, not an estimate.
Section 552.2615 states that a governmental body must send a
"written itemized statement that details all estimated charges that
will be imposed, including any allowable charges for labor or personnel
charges." Because the law recognizes that estimates are by their own
nature, imperfect, the law allows for an actual cost variance of 20%
before a governmental body must update the statement. Sending the
statement is a duty that a governmental body may not evade if it wishes
to collect assessed charges. The mere sending of the estimate does not
obligate the requestor to pay. Indeed, the law states that the
requestor also has certain responsibilities. Upon receiving the written
itemized statement of estimated charges, a requester has the
responsibility to either accept the charges or amend the request.
Llano ISD-Page 2
Either choice must be done in writing to the governmental body within
ten calendar days of receiving the statement. Failure of the requestor
to respond in the manner and time specified by the law means that the
request is considered automatically withdrawn. I have no proof that
Section 552.2615 was followed; therefore, Mr. Chorney does not owe the
charges for the April 15 request. If you provided copies that Mr.
Chorney did not request, you may not charge for those either.
May 25 - Mr. Chorney requested "access" to certain documents.
May 30 - You sent Mr. Chorney a written itemized statement of
estimated charges. Your letter also stated that you would not begin
work on the request until Mr. Chorney paid $105.90 for a prior request.
You may not require payment for the prior request because it was not
provided in accordance with the law and the rules of the General
Services Commission.
Additionally, a governmental body may not assess charges for
inspection or access unless the law-stated criteria are met. The
law-stated criteria are:
* A governmental body may charge for a copy of any page in which
confidential information is mixed with public information. Said charge
is the per page charge, no other charges may be imposed.
* Personnel charges may be imposed for making available for inspection information that meets the following law-stated criteria:
1. The information is more than five years old
OR
2. The information completely fills, or when assembled, will completely fill six or more archival boxes
AND
3. It is estimated that fulfilling the request will take more than five hours.
The information that would be responsive to Mr. Chorney's request
(2000 pages) does not completely fill six archival boxes. Since your
letter asserted that some of the information was older than five years,
please provide me with a breakdown of which records fell in that
category and how many pages they entailed. Also, unless the 2000 pages
contain mixed information, you may not charge for them since Mr.
Chorney asked for access, not copies. For the same reason, the postage
charge is not applicable. For your convenience, I have enclosed a copy
of Mr. Chorney's request that
Llano ISD-Page 3
you can use as a guide. Please note that my previous correspondence
requested that you provide proof that the information was older than
five years as well as a log of how the 200 hours of "research" would be
spent. I have received neither. Failure to provide the documents I need
for a determination may result in a denial of all charges.
Finally, I have received from Ms. Morrison some forms on which to offer my advice. I will try to do that as soon as possible.
If you have any questions, or need further assistance, please feel free to contact me at 512-475-2497, or
at hadassah.schloss@gsc.state.tx.us. I look forward to your response no later than October 30, 2000.
Sincerely,
Hadassah Schloss
Open Records Administrator
Enclosures
cc: Tim Chorney
Publisher
The Llano Ledger
Rt. 2 Box 464A
Buchanan Dam, TX 78609
**********************************
In a never-ending attempt to obfuscate and stonewall, the following
letter from LMHS Administrator/CEO Ernie Parisi was received October
19:
LMHS
Llano Memorial Healthcare System
200 West Ollie
Llano, Tx. 78643
October 18, 2000
VIA/CERTIFIED MAIL/RRR
Mr. Tim Chorney, Publisher
The Llano Ledger
Rt. 2, Box 464A
Buchanan Dam, Tx. 72609 [78609]
Re: Open Records Request of October 11, 2000
Dear Mr. Chorney:
We are in receipt of your Open Records Act request dated October
11, 2000. In that request you have asked for the following documents:
"All vouchers, documents, letters, memos, e-mails regarding
Hospital expenditures on any and all employee expense accounts for the
last five calendar years."
The purpose of this letter is to request clarification of your
request as allowed under the Open Records Act. Llano Memorial
Healthcare System does not have "employee expense accounts." As such,
there are no documents in the form in which you request. However, Llano
Memorial Healthcare System does maintain documents known as "expense
reports" which would contain information regarding expenditures by
hospital employees and might contain the information you are seeking.
At your earliest convenience, please advise us in writing whether
you would like to inspect these "expense reports." Once we have your
written response we will be able to evaluate your request and respond
to you in keeping with the Texas Open Records Act.
Very truly yours,
Ernie Parisi
Administrator/CEO
*******************************************
The following e-mail in response was sent to the "Open" Records Division, October 19, 2000:
Katherine Minter Cary
Interim Division Chief
Open Records Division
Office of the Attorney General
Re: Open Records Stonewalling
October 19, 2000
Dear Ms. Cary:
This is to advise the "Open" Records Division of continued stonewalling by LMHS Administrator/CEO Ernie Parisi.
In an Open Records Request dated October 11, 2000, access to "All
vouchers, documents, letters, memos, e-mails regarding Hospital
expenditures on any and all employee expense accounts for the last five
calendar years" was requested.
In an effort to delay and make access to information as difficult
as possible, Mr. Parisi has chosen to again employ semantics and
sophistry responding in a letter dated October 18, 2000: "Llano
Memorial Healthcare System does not have employee 'expense accounts.'
As such, there are no documents in the form in which you request.
However, Llano Memorial Healthcare System does maintain documents known
as 'expense reports' which would contain information regarding
expenditures by hospital employees and might contain the information
you are seeking."
It does not take a rocket scientist or an attorney to read and
understand the English language. The Open Records Request clearly seeks
all documents germane to Hospital expenditures on employee expenses.
The Administrator knows damn well the "expense reports" are included in
the request.
He has chosen, however, to obfuscate and delay the request by
petulantly and arbitrarily requiring further written response to access
the documents: "At your earliest convenience, please advise us in
writing whether you would like to inspect these 'expense reports.' Once
we have your written response we will be able to evaluate your request
and respond to you in keeping with the Texas Open Records Act."
The "Open" Records Division is advised LMHS has posted a notice in
its Administrative Offices that Open Records Requests may be sent by
e-mail. When questioned, LMHS Executive Secretary Karen Kinard strongly
discouraged doing so. Although this publication usually submits all
information requests in writing, one Open Records Request, however, was
submitted earlier by e-mail to force the issue. After all, the same
policy must be in place for all, not just requestors favored by LMHS.
To his credit, the e-mailed request was honored by the Administrator.
Now, we have an Administrator who is petulantly, arrogantly, and
arbitrarily once again imposing a different set of standards on one of
his staunchest critics. This publication will gladly and cheerfully
comply, however, and sincerely thanks the Administrator for the
additional fodder for the website.
Kindly be advised, no action is expected or requested from the
"Open" Records Division in this matter. Your failure to enforce the
Texas Public Information Act and bias in favor of LMHS is quite clear
to this publication and its readership. This message has been sent to
ensure state officials will not be able to claim ignorance should Llano
Memorial Healthcare System become insolvent.
Sincerely,
Tim Chorney, Publisher
The Llano Ledger
http://maxpages.com/llanoledger
Rt 2 Box 464A
Buchanan Dam, Tx. 78609
cc: Llano Ledger website
cc by e-mail: June B. Harden, Assistant Attorney General, Open Records
Division; David Mendoza, Legal Assistant, Open Records Division; David
Short, Investigator, Open Records Division; John Cornyn, Attorney
General, State of Texas; Ernie Parisi, Administrator/CEO, LMHS; State
Sen. Troy Fraser, Texas State Senate.
*****************************************
The following e-mail was sent to the Attorney General, Friday, October 20:
John Cornyn
Attorney General
State of Texas
Dear Mr. Cornyn:
The enclosed message is indicative of continued stonewalling by
LMHS and the failure of the "Open" Records Division to enforce the
Public Information Act.
Sincerely,
Tim Chorney, Publisher
The Llano Ledger
http://maxpages.com/llanoledger
Rt 2 Box 464A
Buchanan Dam, Tx. 78609
cc: Llano Ledger website
(Forwarded Message)
***********************************************
The following e-mail was sent to State Sen. Troy Fraser, Friday, October 20:
Senator Troy Fraser
Texas State Senate
Re: Public Information Act
October 20, 2000
Dear Senator:
Stonewalling by LMHS has been relentless. The Open Records Division
has glaringly been compromised by the apparently corrupt and abusive
influence of District Attorney Sam Oatman. You and your colleagues
certainly need to take another look at the Public Information Act and
its lack of enforcement by the Attorney General. The enclosed message
to the Open Records Division is indicative of the continuing problem.
Sincerely,
Tim Chorney, Publisher
The Llano Ledger
http://maxpages.com/llanoledger
Rt 2 Box 464A
Buchanan Dam, Tx. 78609
cc: Llano Ledger website
(Forwarded Message)
***************************************
Posting of next week's edition, October 30, 2000, will begin shortly.
Look for it on Newsletter Text V63 on the bottom of the Table of
Contents. The visitor count stands in excess of 34,000, -- another
excellent week and true testament to the shameless willingness of the
readership to "steal" this writer's labor. Certainly, you ought to be
proud of yourselves. Nothing quite like "character", is there? Readers
are advised this writer receives no renumeration from the banner and
pop-up advertising. They only pay for the website itself. There is no
personal compensation, nor are there desperately needed funds for
investigative expenses. Non-profit and outrageously unfunded by the
readership it serves due to greed, gut-wrenching fear, and the
continuing relentless intimidation of corrupt and abusive Llano County
officials, this publication remains as always beholden to NO ONE.
Tim Chorney, Publisher
The Llano Ledger
Tim Chorney, Publisher
P.O. Box 997
Buchanan Dam Tx. 78609
llanoledger@mailcity.com
Page Updated Tue Oct 9, 2001 12:57pm EDT