Keyboard Action

[Ayatollahgondola]

Since I've been hobbled by finances lately, I've been spending a little time thinking of actions we can take that don't require much or anything in the way of funding, but still move our agenda forward. One recent idea has been put into test mode, and because it involves document research, I used our affiliated website, PublicDocumentDistributors.com to engage the action. We made some requests for records from a local municipality, and the time frame for response is getting close. I don't want to get ahead of anything by splaying it on the internet before the results are known, but if they honor the request without a fight, and it proves as useful as I think, we will ask everyone to do the same in their city/county, which we will help you with.

stay tuned

[Ayatollahgondola]

Ok, so here's the effort.

Persons in the country illegally have been encouraged to use the Internal Revenue Service's ITIN method for paying their taxes. ITIN stands for Individual Taxpayer Identification Number. These are ONLY issued to people without a Social Security Account Number. The ITIN is stated by the IRS as NOT being a means of identification other than for tax paying purposes, and therefore does not get the same protection from information requests given a social security number.

I heard several years ago where a teacher in Texas was being paid by the school district under this program, and as such was working illegally.

So I sent a documents request to the Sacramento County Controller for any and all records of any payments under the ITIN system by our County. Persons using the ITIN don't have to be employees of the county, and could also be vendors, or contractors. Companies providing maintanennce for instance.

In any case, it hasn't cost us a thing to make the request thus far, and although this county is claiming there are none, that may not be true in cases farther to the south in this state.

So my request to you is to copy what I've written and make a request to your own city/county controller. I will be more than happy to assist you in this, and even help you draw up the request and shepherd it through.

You'll find a copy of my request and their response attached below this post.

Any takers on this?

[Ayatollahgondola]

an update on this:

I've made the same requests to the City of Los Angeles, and the County of Los Angeles. Thus far, the county has at least recognized the request. The City has not. I'll be updating as the time periods expire or the requests are honored.

[Ayatollahgondola]

an update on this:

I've made the same requests to the City of Los Angeles, and the County of Los Angeles. Thus far, the county has at least recognized the request. The City has not. I'll be updating as the time periods expire or the requests are honored.

Alrighty then!

The County believes that the information we seek is exempt. However, the two exemptions they cited do not apply to part of my request, and the other exemption was based upon the California constitution, section 1, article 1. Basically:

SECTION 1. All people are by nature free and independent and have
inalienable rights. Among these are enjoying and defending life and
liberty, acquiring, possessing, and protecting property, and pursuing
and obtaining safety, happiness, and privacy.

We are not asking for any private information though. We don't want their home addresses, phone numbers or any other private info like that. Since they are or are not working for the county or contracting with them, i believe we are entitled to their names, and the names of their DBA's or company names. Now you may all remember that the sac bee published the names and salaries of all state employees recently. If the state couldn't withhold that, I'm sure we are on solid ground in obtaining what we want.
I also believe where there is smoke..., and I think the county is showing some smoke right now
Onward we go....

[ilbegone]

How would the Freedom Of Information Act apply in this case?

I don't know much about it, but it seems that the Latino race movement has pried quite a bit of information from the Feds and others over the years.

[Ayatollahgondola]

How would the Freedom Of Information Act apply in this case?

I don't know much about it, but it seems that the Latino race movement has pried quite a bit of information from the Feds and others over the years.

FOIA applies to federal entities only. However we have made some FOIA's in regards to this matter, and that's going OK thus far. In fact, it was part of the groundwork for this action. First thing we did was try to generalize the amount of ITIN's in use for a given year, then compartmentalize them by their areas of use. The feds issue them, and keep records of where they are used.

[ilbegone]

Another thing, and I may be barking up a wrong tree, but it seems the press has a right to stuff local entities otherwise stonewall on.

It may depend on lawsuits by the media to get the information dislodged, I seem to remember successful lawsuits over newspapers not being given access to municipal and county information

[Ayatollahgondola]

We've had another denial from the County of LA. This one is describing some sort of invasion of privacy again. I've contacted the FAC, and we hope to have some guidance from them on this. In the interim, I'm drawing up three more PRA's that don't require the names of the users. We'll still pursue the names through a legal challenge, but we'll try to get the remainder of the info through another PRA