Court Hears Bucks County Mom’s Open Records Case
“Transparency is not a political issue,” Brock said. “It is an issue that protects the foundation of our constitutional republic. And it is a right of every citizen to know what is going on behind closed doors.”
From DV Journal by Linda Stein
After a brief hearing Thursday, a judge delayed ruling on whether Bucks County can continue to hide records declared public by the state Office of Open Records (OOR). Richboro resident Megan Brock requested the records, and the OOR ordered the county to turn them over.
Instead, county officials went to court.
Judge Denise Bowman did not say when she would rule.
Brock is seeking emails from August 2021, when the county suddenly overrode COVID-19 guidance issued by its own Health Department Director, Dr. David Damsker, who said the science indicated more parent-friendly, less-restrictive policies. Instead, Bucks County bureaucrats replaced Damsker’s rules with stricter state guidelines for masking, quarantines, and vaccinations.
J. Chadwick Schnee, one of Brock’s lawyers and the author of a book on open records law argued state law “promotes transparency and holds public officials accountable for their actions.”
Keith Bidlingmaier, a lawyer for the county, argued the attorney-client privilege covers the records Brock seeks or are “pre-decisional” and, therefore, exempt under the right-to-know law.
Interestingly, one reason Brock and others want the documents is to see if a partisan Democratic county employee made the decision to override medical guidance with no public health expertise, Eric Nagy, the county’s director of policy and communications.
Meredith Di Liberto, a lawyer for Judicial Watch, a public interest law firm also representing Brock, told DVJournal the county “relied on boilerplate” for its arguments.
“It boils down to saying they’re exempt (from turning over the documents) because they say so,” said Di Liberto.
Outside the courthouse, Brock was joined by state Sen. Jarrett Coleman (R-Bucks/Lehigh) and Jamie Walker, another mother who is being sued by the county in an attempt to deny her documents the state OOR ruled she should be given.
“When that guidance was abruptly changed after a letter was sent by the Wolf administration to our county commissioners, I myself and another mom, Jamie Walker, started asking questions,” Brock said. “We came to the (county) commissioners’ meetings. We wanted to know why our kids were suddenly going to be kept out of school through long quarantines, why they were suddenly going to have their faces (covered) by forced masking, and instead of having our questions answered, our county commissioners bullied us, they called us names. The county commissioners actually blocked my phone number. I was not able to call our county government for 18 months, even during a time when I was physically assaulted by a local township supervisor. I could not contact the district attorney because my phone number was blocked.”
After a long process, Brock won her right-to-know request at the state level.
“However, instead of giving those records, Bucks County sued me three times and sued Jamie Walker twice to withhold records,” said Brock. “This is a huge issue for every citizen in Bucks County, regardless of political affiliation.”
“Transparency is not a political issue,” Brock said. “It is an issue that protects the foundation of our constitutional republic. And it is a right of every citizen to know what is going on behind closed doors.”
Coleman said, “The public deserves to know how local county and state governments made decisions during the COVID-19 pandemic. As chairman of the Senate intergovernmental operations committee, my primary concern is understanding the decision-making process and how much independence the county health director had. Did the Pennsylvania Department of Health intervene when they didn’t like local decisions? Were all the decisions based on medical opinions, or were some overridden for political reasons? And how did these decisions impact children’s education in all of the districts?”
“From what I’ve seen, there is no email from the county health director to other officials outlining the guidance to other officials. And I think we all deserve, especially in Bucks County, to know what actually happened here and why this needs to remain secret.”
DVJournal asked Coleman if his committee plans to subpoena the county commissioners to testify.
“We certainly have the ability to do so,” said Coleman. “That’s why this information is so important. It appears the director never sent the guidance, and that’s concerning. Did the local health department maintain its sovereignty, or did other elected officials in the county usurp his authority and issue guidance?”
Walker said, “Under decades of Republican leadership, this county never sued a citizen to hide the commissioners’ actions. In a few short years under Democratic leadership, these types of lawsuits have now become commonplace in our county.”
“I asked for the emails under Commissioner (Diane) Marseglia’s second, unpublished county email address,” said Walker. “I won these emails already. The county refuses to release them to me. They’re making me hire an attorney and fight them in court. Bucks County residents’ tax dollars are being used to fund the frivolous lawsuits, and this is not how our government should operate.”