Pushback: Court rules that PA school district denied parent public documents in “bad faith” – Behind The Black – Robert Zimmerman

Bring a gun to a knife fight: When Pennsylvania parent Megan Brock demanded, under her state’s right-to-know law, public documents of the Bucks County health department concerning its decisions to impose Wuhan flu lockdowns and school closures (with the office of open records ruling in her favor), county officials then sued her multiple times to try to prevent her access to the records.

The court has now ruled against the county’s lawsuits, while also ruling that the county had operated in “bad faith” and fined it $1,500, the maximum allowed by law.

After the court conducted an in-camera review of the records, Judge Denise M. Bowman ruled on April 28 that more than half of Brock’s requests, which were made under the state’s Right-to-Know Law (RTK), had been withheld “in bad faith.” She ordered the county to release certain documents and pay $1,500 in sanctions for each of the two lawsuits brought against Brock, the maximum allowed under RTK.

You can read the ruling here [pdf]. It notes in particular how county officials had even refused to provide the court one of these documents for review, demonstrating clearly its bad faith.

The county now has to turn over these requested documents to Brock within ten days, as well as pay her the fine. The right-to-know law also includes a $500 per day fine if the county fails to provide, and we should expect that fine to be impose should it continue to defy the law.

Though Brock and her supporters are calling this a massive victory, it should be noted that the court agreed with the county in connection with half the requested documents, allowing the county to deny the public access to them…..