HomeMy Public PortalAboutPRR 16-2379Renee Basel
From: Jonathan O'Boyle <joboyle@oboylelawfirm.com>
Sent: Wednesday, November 2, 2016 6:27 PM
To: OConnor, Joanne M.; Renee Basel; Richard Conforti
Cc: Jonathan O'Boyle
Subject: Chapter 119 Request - Morgan Letter to Coastal Star November 2016.
Under Chapter 119, 1 request the letter, drafts of the letter, and emails, texts, messengers, or other electronic
communications regarding the letter Morgan sent to the Coastal Star. If the Town thinks something may or may not be
responsive, feel free to reach out — in the world of public records, it is far better to ask for permission than forgiveness.
I am looking for things in their original electronic format. Please let me know in advance of special service charges. Also,
can I get the Brannon transcript that the Town just ordered —that should be readily accessible. Since this request is
after hours, let's go ahead and agree that the effective date of this request is November 3, 2016.
Below is the website for reference. If anything is unclear, let me know.
http://th ecoasta lsta r.com/fo ru m/topi cs/lette r-to-the-editor-gu If-stream-confi dent -it -s -o n-the-right-trac
Jonathan O'Boyle, Esq., LLM.
Licensed In Pennsylvania*
Licensed In New Jersey*
Licensed in Florida*
The O'Boyle Law Firm, P.C.
www.obovielawfirm.com
Pennsylvania Office
1001 Broad St.
Johnstown, PA 15906
Tel: 814-535-5175
Fax: 215-893-3641
joboyle@oboyle lawfi rm.com
New Jersey Office
30 Grove St.
Haddonfield, NJ 08033
Tel: 814-535-5175
Fax: 215-893-3641
jobovle@obovlelawfirm.com
Florida Office
1286 West Newport Center Drive
Deerfield Beach, FL 33442
Office: 954-570-3533
Fax: 754-212-2444
j o b o v l e@ o b oy l e l a wfi rm . c o m
IRS Circular 230 disclosure: To ensure compliance with requirements
imposed by the IRS, we inform you that any tax advice contained in this
communication, unless expressly stated otherwise, was not intended or
written to be used, and cannot be used, for the purpose of (i) avoiding
tax -related penalties under the Internal Revenue Code or (ii) promoting,
marketing or recommending to another party any tax -related matter(s)
addressed herein.
NOTICE TO RECIPIENT: THIS E-MAIL IS MEANT FOR ONLY
THE INTENDED RECIPIENT OF THE TRANSMISSION, AND
MAY BE A COMMUNICATION PRIVILEGED BY LAW. IF YOU
RECEIVED THIS E- MAIL IN ERROR, ANY REVIEW, USE,
DISSEMINATION, DISTRIBUTION, OR COPYING OF THIS
E-MAIL IS STRICTLY PROHIBITED. PLEASE NOTIFY US
IMMEDIATELY OF THE ERROR BY RETURN E-MAIL AND
PLEASE DELETE THIS MESSAGE FROM YOUR SYSTEM.
THANK YOU IN ADVANCE FOR YOUR COOPERATION.
TOWN OF GULF STREAM
PALM BEACH COUNTY, FLORIDA
Delivered via e-mail
November 7, 2016
Jonathan O'Boyle [mail to: ioboyle(aZobovlelawfirm.coml
Re: GS #2379 (Chapter 119 Request — Morgan Letter to Coastal Star November 2016)
Under Chapter 119,1 request the letter, drafts of the letter, and emails, texts, messengers, or other
electronic communications regarding the letter Morgan sent to the Coastal Star. If the Town
thinks something may or may not be responsive, feel free to reach out — in the world of public
records, it is far better to ask for permission than forgiveness.
I am looking for things in their original electronic format. Please let me know in advance of
special service charges. Also, can 1 get the Brannon transcript that the Town just ordered — that
should be readily accessible. Since this request is after hours, let's go ahead and agree that the
effective date of this request is November 3, 2016.
Dear Jonathan O'Boyle [mail to: iobovleaa.oboylelawfirm.coml:
The Town of Gulf Stream has received your public records requests dated November 2, 2016. The
original public records request can be found at the following link:
hgp://www2.gulf-stream.org/weblink/O/doc/I03442/Pa eg 1 asox
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.
Regarding the Brannon transcript, I believe Joanne O'Connor has already e-mailed you with the
advisement that we do not have the Brannon transcript yet, and that it is not expected to be
delivered until November 11, 2016.
Sincerely,
As requested by Rita Taylor
Town Clerk, Custodian of the Records
TOWN OF GULF STREAM
PALM BEACH COUNTY, FLORIDA
Delivered via e-mail
November 23, 2016
Jonathan O'Boyle [mail to: iobovleeobovlelawfirm.coml
Re: GS #2379 (Chapter 119 Request — Morgan Letter to Coastal Star November 2016)
Under Chapter 119, I request the letter, drafts of the letter, and emails, texts, messengers, or
other electronic communications regarding the letter Morgan sent to the Coastal Star. If the
Town thinks something may or may not be responsive, feel free to reach out — in the world of
public records, it is far better to ask for permission than forgiveness.
I am looking for things in their original electronic format. Please let me know in advance of
special service charges. Also, can I get the Brannon transcript that the Town just ordered — that
should be readily accessible. Since this request is after hours, let's go ahead and agree that the
effective date of this request is November 3, 2016.
Dear Jonathan O'Boyle [mail to: jobovle(i4obovlelawfirm.coml:
The Town of Gulf Stream has received your public records request dated November 2, 2016.
Your original public records request and response to your request can be found at the following
link:
hqp://www2.gulf-stream.org/weblink/O/doc/103442/Pagel asux
Per your request, we have also attached the response in original electronic format.
As for the part of your request for the "Brannon transcript that the Town just ordered," there was
no record responsive when your request was made. However, as a courtesy, we wanted to
inform you that it is now publicly available on the Town website at the following link:
htto://www2.gulf-stream.orWweblink/0/doc/103700/Pa el asux
We consider this request closed.
Sincerely,
R"I d Row" $wiz
As requested by Rita Taylor
Town Clerk, Custodian of the Records
Renee Basel
From:
Scott Morgan
Sent:
Tuesday, October 4, 2016 11:05 AM
To:
Mary Leming
Subject:
Re: The Coastal Star
Attachments:
Gulf Stream.docx
Hi Mary Kate,
Attached are my thoughts on the court decision in Word format for review and editing.
Thank you.
Scott Morgan
561-573-6006
From: Mary Leming <m_k_I@bellsouth.net>
Sent: Wednesday, September 21, 2016 2:35 PM
To: Scott Morgan
Cc: Jerry Lower, Dan Moffett
Subject: The Coastal Star
Mayor Morgan - Dan Moffett shared with me your wishes to communicate your thoughts on the latest
court decision in the O'Boyle case. If you would like us to publish these there are three ways we can
accommodate:
1) If this can be shortened to 200-500 words, I can accept it as a Letter to the Editor. I do think much
of what you have written is covered in Dan's upcoming story or has been reported in the past, so it
may not be too difficult to shorten this to a standard letter -length.
2) 1 can publish this in the long form, but would need to reach out to the O'Boyle team and provide
them with the equal opportunity to submit their comments. I did this once before when they requested
we publish some of their thoughts and Mr. Ganger was kind enough to write a response for the town.
3) We can treat your comments as a paid advertisement and you can have control over the length
and message.
If any of these options are agreeable to you, please let me know. We are running into our deadline for
the October edition, so would need this before Friday.
I will, of course, need your notes in electronic form to proceed.
I might suggest that you consider waiting until our November edition to have your thoughts published.
Even in today's Twitter -world, it is sometimes helpful to gauge feedback to a published news story
before publishing a response.
I hope this is helpful. Please let me know if you have any questions/concerns.
Mary Kate
Mary Kate Leming
Editor, The Coastal Star
editor@thecoastalstar.com
561-337-1553
www.thecoastalstar.com
Twitter: A1AStar
In 2014 and early 2015, the Town of Gulf Stream found itself under assault from Martin
O'Boyle and Christopher O'Hare, two residents who overwhelmed the town with thousands of
public records requests and dozens of lawsuits. Gulf Stream's public records clerk resigned
because of the volume of requests, as did her replacement. It reached a point where Town Hall
was virtually unable to perform its regular duties to Gulf Stream residents. Consequently, the
Commission made a decision to defend the Town against this ongoing public records abuse.
Gulf Stream brought in legal staff to create a uniform and workable policy to respond to public
records requests. In addition, Gulf Stream learned through its RICO investigation about
statewide abuses committed by the O'Boyle Law Firm and a related and apparently false non-
profit O'Boyle company called Citizens Awareness Foundation, which it added to the Town's
defenses in the public records lawsuits.
Since Gulf Stream took these actions, public records requests have dropped from
upwards of 80 in one day down to just several a week, which the Town's staff is now able to
handle. In addition, there has not been another public records lawsuit against Gulf Stream in
over a year and a half, and of the old lawsuits, Gulf Stream won or forced the dismissal of four
of them, and won verdicts or forced the dismissal of six additional non-public records lawsuits.
(O'Boyle v. Gulf Stream, 2014 no. 5189; O'Hare v. Gulf Stream, 2014 no. 18102; O'Hare v. Gulf
Stream, 2014 no. 818; and Citizens Awareness Foundation, Inc. v. Gulf Stream, 2014 no. 3396;
O'Boyle v. Gulf Stream, UDSC 14 no. 81248; O'Hare v. Gulf Stream, USDC 13 no. 81053; O'Hare
v. Gulf Stream, 2014 no. 7327; O'Boyle v. Morgan, et al., USDC 14 no. 81250; O'Hare v. Gulf
Stream, 2014 no. 720 and O'Hare v. Morgan, 2013 no. 17717).
I cannot overstate how the volume of lawsuits and records requests back in 2013 and
2014 overwhelmed our small staff. The clerks regularly worked nights and weekends; they put
off other town responsibilities to handle the growing number of requests; they hunted through
dusty storage boxes, old file cabinets and closed land use folders trying to respond to requests
that poured in almost daily; they called Commissioners, ARPB members, past employees and
active and retired policemen to identify documents and their possible locations; but, the
quantity of these requests was simply not manageable, and some documents were
inadvertently missed. At no time did staff refuse the legitimacy of Mr. O'Boyle or Mr. O'Hare's
requests or otherwise try to prevent them from receiving documents, regardless of how
complex and burdensome their requests had become. For example, one such request required
production of "All photos of people riding bicycles on N. Ocean Blvd. in the Town's public
record." Since Town records go back to its founding in 1925, this request necessitated a time-
consuming, needle -in -the -haystack type of search, and for which we were still sued over a
"gotcha" photograph. Another case currently being litigated is one that involves some
inadvertently missed documents. Although the Town acted in good faith in trying to locate all
records requested by Mr. O'Boyle, those missing records constituted a technical violation of the
public records law, so we offered to settle the case. Mr. O'Boyle's settlement demand,
however, was so outrageously high that the Town concluded it was in its best financial interest
to take the case to trial and let a judge determine the reasonable amount of fees. That case was
tried recently and the judge will be holding a hearing on fees in the near future.
The Town is confident that pursuant to Florida law, the court will only award fees up to
the performance of the records request and not beyond. Mr. O'Boyle, on the other hand, drove
up his legal fees well beyond that point in time and is now trying to collect that money, and
more, from Gulf Stream. Mr. O'Boyle is only entitled to receive a small fraction of his
settlement demand and of the attorney's fees he spent in the case. This is why the Town
elected to try this case, as it will any other case where it appears that Mr. O'Boyle built up large
attorneys' fees just to profit the O'Boyle law firm or Mr. O'Boyle's foundation.
Gulf Stream will continue to defend the remaining O'Boyle and O'Hare lawsuits until our
two litigious residents drop the meritless cases and accept our reasonable offers of settlement
on the others.
Renee Basel
From:
Mary Leming <m_k_I@bellsouth.net>
Sent:
Tuesday, October 4, 2016 1:37 PM
To:
Scott Morgan
Subject:
Re: The Coastal Star
Thank you. I will send back a shortened version for your review.
Because of the storm, it may be next week before we can get to this, however...
Mary Kate
Mary Kate Leming
Editor, The Coastal Star
editor@thecoastalstar.com
561-337-1553
www.thecoastalstar.com
Twitter: A1AStar
From: Scott Morgan <SMorgan@gulf-stream.org>
To: Mary Leming <m_k_I@bellsouth.net>
Sent: Tuesday, October 4, 2016 11:05 AM
Subject: Re: The Coastal Star
Hi Mary Kate,
Attached are my thoughts on the court decision in Word format for review and editing.
Thank you.
Scott Morgan
561-573-6006
From: Mary Leming <m_k_I@bellsouth.net>
Sent: Wednesday, September 21, 2016 2:35 PM
To: Scott Morgan
Cc: Jerry Lower; Dan Moffett
Subject: The Coastal Star
Mayor Morgan - Dan Moffett shared with me your wishes to communicate your thoughts on the latest
court decision in the O'Boyle case. If you would like us to publish these there are three ways we can
accommodate:
1) If this can be shortened to 200-500 words, I can accept it as a Letter to the Editor. I do think much
of what you have written is covered in Dan's upcoming story or has been reported in the past, so it
may not be too difficult to shorten this to a standard letter -length.
2) 1 can publish this in the long form, but would need to reach out to the O'Boyle team and provide
them with the equal opportunity to submit their comments. I did this once before when they requested
we publish some of their thoughts and Mr. Ganger was kind enough to write a response for the town.
3) We can treat your comments as a paid advertisement and you can have control over the length
and message.
If any of these options are agreeable to you, please let me know. We are running into our deadline for
the October edition, so would need this before Friday.
will, of course, need your notes in electronic form to proceed.
I might suggest that you consider waiting until our November edition to have your thoughts published.
Even in today's Twitter -world, it is sometimes helpful to gauge feedback to a published news story
before publishing a response.
I hope this is helpful. Please let me know if you have any questions/concerns.
Mary Kate
Mary Kate Leming
Editor, The Coastal Star
editor@thecoastalstar.com
561-337-1553
www.thecoastalstar.com
Twitter: A1AStar
Renee Basel
From: Mary Leming <m k_I@bellsouth.net>
Sent: Sunday, October 9, 2016 5:22 PM
To: Scott Morgan
Subject: Letter to the Editor
Attachments: Gulf Stream V2-vp.doc
Mayor Morgan - I am attaching an edited version of your letter. We were able to get this down to near
500 words and I believe still retain the message you hope to deliver.
If you see any errors, please let me know. It's always possible we inadvertently inserted some in the
editing process.
I will be out of the country this coming week and back on Sunday the 16th.
I do hope to have Internet access, but you can't always count on that in the Bahamas.
Our deadline for fine tuning this would not be until later in the month; sometime around the 26th.
Hope you survived the storm with little or no damage.
Sincerely,
Mary Kate
Mary Kate Leming
Editor, The Coastal Star
editor@thecoastaistar.com
561-337-1553
www.thecoastalstar.com
Twitter: A1AStar
Letter to the Editor
Suggested headline:
In 2014 and early 2015, the town of Gulf Stream found itself under assault from Martin O'Boyle and
Christopher O'Hare, two residents who overwhelmed the town with hundreds of public records requests
and dozens of lawsuits. Town Hall became virtually unable to serve Gulf Stream residents.
To defend against this ongoing public records abuse, Gulf Stream brought in legal staff to create a
policy to respond to records requests. In addition, Gulf Stream learned through its RICO investigation
about other Florida abuses committed by the O'Boyle Law Firm and a related O'Boyle company called
Citizens Awareness Foundation, which it added to the town's defenses in the public records lawsuits.
Since Gulf Stream took these actions, public records requests have dropped from 80 -plus per day down
to several a week. In addition, there has not been another public records lawsuit against Gulf Stream in
over a year and a half. Of the old lawsuits, Gulf Stream won or forced the dismissal of four of them, and
won verdicts or forced the dismissal of six additional nonpublic records lawsuits.
I cannot overstate how the volume of lawsuits and records requests back in 2013 and 2014
overwhelmed our small staff. The clerks regularly worked nights and weekends; they put off other town
responsibilities; they hunted through old file cabinets and closed land use folders trying to respond to
requests pouring in almost daily; they called commissioners, board members, past employees and active
and retired police to identify documents and their possible locations. But, the quantity of these requests
was simply not manageable, and some documents were inadvertently missed.
At no time did staff refuse the legitimacy of O'Boyle's or O'Hare's requests or try to prevent them from
receiving documents. For example, one such request required production of "All photos of people riding
bicycles on N. Ocean Blvd. in the town's public record." Since town records go back to its founding in
1925, this request necessitated a needle -in -the -haystack search, and for which we were still sued over a
"gotcha" photograph.
A case currently being litigated involves some inadvertently missed documents. Despite a good faith
effort to locate all requested records, missing records constitute a technical violation of the public records
law, so the town offered to settle the case. O'Boyle's settlement demand, however, was so outrageously
high that the town concluded it was in its best financial interest to go to trial and let a judge determine
reasonable fees. That case was tried recently and there will be a hearing on fees in the near future.
The town is confident that under Florida law, the court will award fees up to the performance of the
records request and not beyond. This is why the town elected to try this case, as it will any other case
where it appears that O'Boyle built up large attorneys' fees.
Gulf Stream will continue to defend the remaining O'Boyle and O'Hare lawsuits until our two litigious
residents drop the meritless cases and accept our settlement offers on the others.
Scott W. Morgan
Mayor, Gulf Stream