HomeMy Public PortalAboutPRR 16-2325Renee Basel
From: Chris O'Hare <chrisoharegulfstream@gmail.com>
Sent: Saturday, September 24, 2016 7:40 PM
To: Bill Thrasher; Rita Taylor; Renee Basel; jrandolph@jonesfoster.com
Subject: Public Record Request - Mathews Consulting modified agreement
Dear Custodian of Records,
I request to inspect certain public records related to the Town of Gulf Stream Florida.
While I am not statutorily obligated to explain why I want to inspect these records, I tell you it is for the
purpose of informing myself of the historic and current workings of the Town of Gulf Stream and its
associated entities, vendors, consultants, advisers, contractors and agents. The records I wish to
inspect may also be material to current, anticipated or presently unforeseen legal action. In addition,
inspection of these records may be essential to my ability to make informed comments in an
upcoming public hearing. The production of any and all responsive records is therefore urgent and
must be acted upon in compliance with Florida Statutes and established case law as soon as
possible.
Before making this public record request, I first searched online and in the public records portion of
your agency's website hoping I could locate the public records I seek without having to write you
directly. Unfortunately I cannot find the records I wish to inspect. Therefore I am writing you now and
requesting you make every effort as required by law to produce these public records without delay.
The public records I seek to inspect may be in the custody of an entity currently or previously
associated with, or under contract with, your agency. As a courtesy to you and that entity, and to
assist in expediting my access to inspect records responsive to this request I am notifying that entity,
the Town Attorney, of this request by copy of this email. I am NOT requesting the Town
Attorney produce responsive records directly to me. Rather I am alerting him to my request to you so
that he may prepare to assist you, if he choose to, in producing responsive records. Do not assume
my act of copying the Town Attorney with this request relieves you of any of your duties under Florida
Statute. I ask that you contact the Town Attorney in order to obtain all Public records responsive to
this request.
I make this request pursuant to Article 1, Section 24 of the Florida Constitution and Chapter 119 of
the Florida Statutes. I hereby reserve all rights granted to me under the Florida
Constitution and Florida Statutes.
I
I ask that you take the following action:
• Read this entire request carefully and respond accordingly.
• If you are not the custodian of the public records described herein please determine who that person is and
notify me immediately in order that I may make this request to the appropriate person without delay.
• Reference Florida Statutes and appropriate case law when responding to this record request.
• Do NOT produce any records other than records responsive to this request.
• Identify by name the person or persons responding to this request if that person is not the Custodian of
Records for your agency as required by 119.07(1)(b).
• Respond to this public record request in a singular manner and do not combine this
request with any other public record requests when responding to this request.
• Once you have determined that you do or don't have any records in your
custody responsive to this request, immediately act to obtain any responsive records
that may be in the custody of your contractor(s) or other parties.
• Provide only those records for inspection that do not require extensive use of
information technologies or extensive staff time or both in excess of 15 minutes.
• If records responsive to this request are not presently available but you expect that
they will soon be available I request that you produce the records as soon as they are
available.
I ask you to take note of §119.07(1)(c) Florida Statues and your affirmative obligation to (1)
promptly acknowledge receipt of this public records request and (2) make a good faith effort which
"includes making reasonable efforts to determine from other officers or employees within the agency
whether such a record exists and, if so, the location at which the record can be accessed." I am,
therefore, requesting that you notify every individual and entity in possession of records that may be
responsive to this public records request, including individuals and entities under contract with your
agency, to preserve and produce all responsive records on an immediate basis.
If you contend that any of the records I am seeking, or any portion thereof, are exempt from
inspection or disclosure please cite the specific exemption as required by §119.07(1)(e) of the Florida
Statutes and state in writing and with particularity the basis for your conclusions as required
by §119.07(1)(f) of the Florida Statutes. Produce for my inspection all responsive records and ONLY
redact that portion of the record that you consider exempt. To be clear, if you consider an entire
record to be exempt, produce that record in its entirety with all portions redacted that you consider
exempt. I specifically ask you to do this in order that I may inspect fully redacted records for the
purpose of challenging a particular redaction or establishing a reference for a future request of a
record that is only temporarily exempt, as in the case of a public record that was prepared by an
agency attorney exclusively for litigation and is only exempt from disclosure until the conclusion of the
litigation.
If the public records being sought are maintained by your agency or contactors for your agency, in an
electronic format please produce the records in the original electronic format in which they were
created or received. See §119.01(2)(f), Florida Statutes.
Again I ask that you provide only those records for inspection that do not require extensive use of
information technologies or extensive staff time or both in excess of 15 minutes. Take note
of §119.07(4)(a)3.(d) Florida Statues and if you anticipate that any records exist, the production for
inspection of which will require extensive use of information technologies or extensive staff time or
both in excess of 15 minutes, then please provide those records that can be produced within the first
15 minutes and advise me of the cost you anticipate to be incurred by your agency for the remaining
records prior to incurring this cost. Please do not incur any costs on my behalf without first obtaining
my written authorization to proceed. If you produce only a portion of all existing responsive records,
please tell me that your response includes only a portion of all existing records responsive to this
request.
If you anticipate the need to incur any costs that I would be statutorily required to pay in order to
inspect these public records which would exceed $1.00 please notify me in advance of your incurring
that cost with a written estimate of the total cost. Please be sure to itemize any estimates so as to
indicate the total number of pages and/or records, as well as to distinguish the cost of labor and
materials. Again, please do not incur any costs on my behalf without first obtaining my written
authorization to proceed.
A record that does not exist because of its disposition requires the creation of a disposition record. In
all instances where you determine a record does not exist please determine if the record once existed
and in its replacement provide the disposition record for my inspection.
As background to this request I call your attention to Agenda Item # IX. B. Agreement for General
Engineering Services - Mathews Consulting which was part of the Agenda of the Sept 9, 2016 Regular
Meeting and Public Hearing held by the Town Commission. Despite being prepared by Town's legal
counsel, the agreement was legally insufficient. During that meeting, in an effort to help the Town avoid
any more violations of Florida Statute Chapter 119, I called the Commission's attention to text missing
from that agreement which is now required by Florida Statute, specifically §119.0701(2)(a)
and §119.0701(2)(b). Commissioner Stanley subsequently moved to approve the agreement conditioned
upon the addition of the missing text mandated by §119.0701(2)(a) and §119.0701(2)(b). I request to
inspect the public record of that modified agreement which now includes the text referenced in
Commissioner Stanley's Motion to Approve; which text is also clearly identified in §119.0701(2)(a)
and §119.0701(2)(b).
The term public records, as used herein, has the same meaning and scope as the definition of Public
records adopted by the Florida Legislature as Statutes Chapter 119.
The phrase Town of Gulf Stream when used herein refers to the Town in its entirety and all entities of
the Town including all employees, appointees, officials, assignees, counsel and consultants including
Town Manager, Town Clerk, Town Police Chief, Town Commissioners, Town Mayor, Town
Departments, Town Police Officers, Town Employees, Town Engineer, the law firm (Jones Foster
Johnston & Stubbs P.A.) that claims to be the Town Attorney including all attorney, partner and
employee members of that firm; the Town Counsel of Sweetapple, Broeker & Varkus including all
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attorney, partner and employee members of that firm, the Town Counsel of Richman Greer, P.A.
including all attorney, partner and employee members of that firm and any other entity associated
with the Town and subject to public records law.
If you do not understand any part of this request or if you need clarification about this request, notify me as
soon as possible so I may further describe or clarify this request.
All responses to this public records request should be made in writing to the following email address:
chrisoharegulfstream@gmaii.com
TOWN OF GULF STREAM
PALM BEACH COUNTY, FLORIDA
Delivered via e-mail
September 28, 2016
Chris O'Hare [mail to: chrisoharegulfstream(a,gmail.coml
Re: GS #2325 (Mathews Consulting modified agreement)
As background to this request 1 call your attention to Agenda Item # LK B. Agreement for
General Engineering Services - Mathews Consulting which was part of the Agenda of the Sept 9,
2016 Regular Meeting and Public Hearing held by the Town Commission. Despite being
prepared by Town's legal counsel, the agreement was legally insufficient. During that meeting,
in an effort to help the Town avoid any more violations of Florida Statute Chapter 119, I called
the Commission's attention to text missing from that agreement which is now required by Florida
Statute, specifically §119.0701(2)(x) and §119.0701(2)(b). Commissioner Stanley subsequently
moved to approve the agreement conditioned upon the addition of the missing text mandated by
§119.070](2)(a) and §119.0701(2)(b). I request to inspect the public record of that modified
agreement which now includes the text referenced in Commissioner Stanley's Motion to
Approve; which text is also clearly identified in §119.0701(2)(a) and §119.070](2)(b).
Dear Chris O'Hare [mail to: chrisohareRulfstream(i)gmail.coml,
The Town of Gulf Stream has received your original record requests dated September 24, 2016.
Your original public records request can be found at the following link:
htti)://www2.gulf-stream.org/weblink/O/doc/I02162/PageI.ast)x
The response to your request can be found at the following link:
http://www2.gulf-stream.org/weblink/O/doc/I02027/Pa 02027/Page l.asnx
We consider this request closed.
Sincerely,
Rene6 Rowan Basel
As requested by Rita Taylor
Town Clerk, Custodian of the Records
TOWN OF GULF STREAM
PALM BEACH COUNTY, FLORIDA
Delivered via e-mail
September 27, 2016
Chris O'Hare [mail to: chrisoharegulfstream(a,email.comj
Re: GS #2325 (Mathews Consulting modified agreement)
As background to this request 1 call your attention to Agenda Item # IX. B. Agreement for General
Engineering Services - Mathews Consulting which was part of the Agenda of the Sept 9, 2016
Regular Meeting and Public Hearing held by the Town Commission. Despite being prepared by
Town's legal counsel, the agreement was legally insufficient. During that meeting in an effort to
help the Town avoid any more violations ofFlorida Statute Chapter 119,1 called the Commission's
attention to text missing from that agreement which is now required by Florida Statute, specifically
§119.0701(2)(a) and §119.0701(2)(6). Commissioner Stanley subsequently moved to approve the
agreement conditioned upon the addition of the missing text mandated by §119.070](2)(a) and
§119.0701(2)(b). 1 request to inspect the public record of that modified agreement which now
includes the text referenced in Commissioner Stanley's Motion to Approve; which text is also
clearly identified in §I19.0701(2)(a) and §119.0701(2)(b).
Dear Chris O'Hare [mail to: chrisoharegulfstreatni( gmail.coml,
The Town of Gulf Stream has received your public records request dated September 24, 2016. The
original public record request can be found at the following link:
h!W://www2.zulf-stream.orgJweblink/0/doc/102162/Pa el asux
Please be advised that the Town of Gulf Stream is currently working on a large number of
incoming public records requests. The Town will use its very best efforts to respond to you in a
reasonable amount of time with the appropriate response or an estimated cost to respond.
Sincerely,
As requested by Rita Taylor
Town Clerk, Custodian of the Records