The City of Nashua has engaged in a game of hiding records and subverting the spirit of the Right-to-Know. In 2021, self-represented, I won several Court rulings on Right-to-Know petitions. I won both cases, but the City appealed the Judge’s ruling to the Supreme Court.
The first case was briefed and presented for oral arguments before the Supreme Court on March 21, 2023.
Nashua Deputy Counsel Attorney Leonard represented the City during oral arguments. She introduced a new argument to the Supreme Court to claim that my request for assessing (AssessHelp) emails sent to the assessing office was not sent to the proper “agency.”
Ms. Leonard stated in oral arguments:
To your earlier question, Chief Justice, the trial court did find that the records were readily accessible from the backup tape to the IT department. There are no IT documents requested in either of the cases. It was the assessing department. And the City has one name, but the City is many little agencies. The assessing department S drive is different from the — or U drive is different from the legal department, is different from administrative services, community development, public works. They’re different agencies. It is IT that then has to be contacted. It’s not readily available to the agency itself, in either.
The City refuses to tell citizens how the records are stored and where they are located. In the recent past, the City would forward a request that was submitted to the wrong agency to the proper agency for response. Apparently, this has stopped.
In my case, within 60 days, emails were moved to a backup tape in violation of the Municipal records retention act and the Right to Know statute, as the City never responded to my request for the records within the 5 days required by law. Additionally, in violation of the law, the City did not cite the statute to deny the records and did not disclose that the records had been moved to backup tape. I filed the lawsuit based on this lack of compliance.
Assessing staff believed that AssessHelp emails were not moved to backup tape as the city had no written policy on backup tape storage for AssessHelp emails. During the Superior Court Trial, the Office Clerical Supervisor stated that she was unaware of the City policy for email retention and she had never heard of the Municipal Records Statute.
If the experts closest to the information are unaware of the City’s policies and are uneducated on the laws, how are citizens supposed to know where these records are located? We are not mind readers. Attorney Leonard’s persistent lack of candor and misrepresentation to the Courts should be a sanctionable offense within the Rules of Attorney Professional Conduct. Nashua’s leaders are engaging in acts of Official Oppression, under RSA 643:1 and should be charged with misdemeanors for their conduct.
A lack of transparency is a symptom of dishonesty.
