Central WAS NOT Billed for Redaction of Records

     In a letter to Mayor Watts dated November 12th, Central City Attorney Sheri Morris responded to an article written by Woody Jenkins in a local newspaper last week.  In the article Jenkins claims Ms. Morris’ legal bills to the City “include substantial fees for the time she spent ‘redacting’ her previous bills and then ‘unredacting’ those same bills.”  In her letter Ms. Morris, who only last week was reconfirmed by the City Council as Central’s City Attorney, addresses the entire process undertaken by the City in response to the records request for legal bills.  The letter, presented in its entirety below, explains that by law Central’s attorney-client privilege must be protected, even in a public records request, and that only the City Council and Mayor can waive that privilege.  The letter specifically refutes and calls “false” all claims by Jenkins that the City of Central was charged for the “redacting” or “unredacting” of legal bills.  Ms. Morris asserts that the July and August invoices “refute Mr. Jenkins’ statements.”

Dear Mayor Watts:

    In response to the November 11, 2010, Central City News article subtitled “Blacking Out Billing Records Proves Costly for Taxpayers” by Editor, Woody Jenkins, enclosed please find information to dispute the reckless, false and defamatory allegations published by Mr. Jenkins.

    Attached (see below) is a chronology showing the relevant events regarding the response to the public records request for invoices for legal services and related documents. As you can see, Mr. Jenkins’ statement that repeated requests were necessary for Mr. Mannino to obtain copies of the records is completely false. Mr. Mannino’s request to inspect records relating to the City of Central and the Central Transition District were received at City Hall on the afternoon of Wednesday, July 28, 2010. These requests were for numerous public records, some of which are only maintained in electronic form, spanning a five year period. On the morning of July 30, 2010, Mr. Mannino, Mr. Jenkins and others arrived at City Hall to inspect the requested records. Additionally, Mr. Mannino and Mr. Jenkins were provided with copies of numerous records which they requested.

    Among the records requested were copies of invoices for legal services which contain itemized descriptions of work performed. The invoices were redacted prior to production in order to maintain the attorney-client privilege. While it has been reported by the Central City News in numerous articles that Mr. Mannino has stated, “the attorney-client privilege is not an exception to Louisiana’s Public Records Law”, the section of the public records law entitled “Exceptions,” La. R.S. 4.1, clearly recognizes the attorney-client privilege. 

    Clients have the ability to waive the attorney-client privilege. Unlike a privilege in favor of an individual, a privilege in favor of a public entity must be waived by the governing authority of the public entity, i.e. the City Council with the consent of the Mayor. In order to comply with the time delays in the Louisiana Public Records Law, redacted invoices were provided to Mr. Mannino until the City Council could consider the issue of waiving the attorney-client privilege for the City’s invoices and appropriate actions could be taken concerning the Central Transition District’s invoices.

    The redacted legal bills for all firms which performed legal services for the City of Central and for the Central Transition District were provided as a courtesy to the City of Central by Roedel, Parsons. The process of redacting the bills by using software, which allowed removal of some or all of the redactions at a later date, was time consuming and required the participation of myself, other attorneys and support staff; however, the firm did not charge for my time or for the time of other attorneys or our support staff who worked overtime to assist in redacting the legal invoices.

    At the August 10, 2010 City Council meeting which was the next meeting following receipt of the public records requests, the City Council voted to waive the attorney-client privilege for invoice entries which did not involve matters related to pending or prospective litigation. Once the privilege was waived by the City Council the process of reviewing the invoices to identify information related to pending or prospective litigation began.

    Prior to completion of the review of all invoices, I was requested to participate in a meeting with Mr. Mannino and Council members LoBue and Washington. I believe that the August 20, 2010 meeting was productive resulting in an agreement with Mr. Mannino concerning handling the remaining records requests. At this meeting it became evident that there was a misunderstanding concerning the procedure for reviewing legal invoices.

    At the August 24, 2010 Council meeting, the Council clarified the procedure for reviewing legal invoices. On August 26, 2010, a majority of the Central Transition District (“District”) members agreed to waive the attorney-client privilege for the District’s invoices and the invoices were immediately made available for inspection. By week’s end all invoices for the City of Central were delivered to Steven Stockstill, who indicated he reviewed 691 pages of invoices containing 2,863 billing entries.

    The following statements published by Mr. Jenkins are false: 1) “The bills reportedly include a substantial sum for legal services performed in connection with public records requests for previous legal bills she has submitted”; 2) “Now Morris’ legal bills for July and August to the city include substantial fees for the time she spent ‘redacting’ her previous bills and then ‘unredacting’ those same bills”; and 3) “Morris’ charges for July and August include the time she spent blacking out her bills and then later providing unredacted copies to Mannino.”  Clearly, the July and August 2010 invoices I submitted to the City refute Mr. Jenkins’ statements.

While the invoices for July and August 2010 include substantial charges for services performed in connection with public records requests, these charges relate to 14 separate requests received within a 29 day period.

    If you or any of the Council members have any concerns about the handling of the public records requests or any invoice for legal services, Larry Roedel and I will be happy to meet with you to discuss the charges.

    Very truly yours,

ROEDEL, PARSONS, KOCH, BLACHE, BALHOFF & McCOLLISTER, A L.C.

Sheri M. Morris, City Attorney

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