Orsi wants closed-session documents returned

By NATHAN TAYLOR, THE PACKET & TIMES January 12 2011
The previous city council is being asked to return all closed-session documents and reports so they can be destroyed.

The former council members received a letter dated Jan. 6 from city clerk Gayle Jackson, advising she had been “requested by Mayor Orsi to contact all members of the 2006-2010 city council with respect to the return of all reports, records and correspondence which you may have in your possession as a result of council committee in closed session meetings.”
“Please return any items of this nature to my office by February 7, 2011 for destruction in conjunction with the city’s annual records purge,” Jackson wrote.
The yearly purge has in previous years not included a collection of such documents from former council members, but it should be common practice, Orsi said.
“Bottom line is we need to make sure that any and all documents are back in the city hands. It’s just good business management,” he said.
Former mayor Ron Stevens, now a councillor in Severn Township, did his own records purge. He said he was surprised at the request to return the documents.
“There’s no obligation to do so. I don’t know if this is a witch hunt or what. From my point of view, there is nothing of interest to them,” Stevens said. “If it was dealt with by the former council in a confidential manner, don’t you think it should stay that way?”
The new council won’t be viewing the documents. Rather, they will be destroyed, Orsi said.
“Even at the end of our term, I would like to have all the information returned to the city for shredding, me included,” he said, adding destroying the documents is a way to “make sure that we’re not surprised at any information out there.”
Some area municipalities have different ways of dealing with closed-session information.
In Oro-Medonte Township, the blue-paper documents often don’t leave the meeting room.
“In most cases, that information is left with staff,” Mayor Harry Hughes said.
Also, it’s up to individual municipalities to decide how to deal with those types of documents.
“A councillor swears an oath to not divulge any information that is confidential,” he added.
Neither Hughes nor Ramara Township Mayor Bill Duffy have called for a return of closed-session documents from past council members, but it’s not such a bad idea, Duffy said.
“I would say most councillors should turn that in. If you turn that back in, nobody else can get a hold of it.”