Partly as a result of the California Highway Patrol's scandal of last year involving "Chief's Disease" and the large volume of workers' comp. claims made by high officials close to retirement, advocates of open government conducted a special "test" last month.
It involved auditing all levels of the state's law enforcement agencies to test how compliant they were concerning the laws requiring them to disclose (in a timely manner) public information upon request.
The audit was conducted by a large group of news agencies and other First Amendment advocates called "Californians Aware," or CalAware, a nonprofit group out of Sacramento.
The group made formal requests for information ranging from statistics on internal discipline and workers' compensation claims to the salaries of key officials.
Remarkably, more than half of the audited agencies FAILED to make the information timely available, despite the legal mandate to do so. Some wouldn't provide any of the requested information at all. Others wanted to know why the request was being made -- even though the law authorizing such requests prohibits such questions. Many of the agencies claimed to not even being aware of the law authorizing such requests.
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