Council Votes 9-0 To Preserve Pending Further Action (Instead of Authorize Destruction of) Several Years Of Records of Mayors' Offices And 7th dist. Council Offices
(August 2, 2014) -- As seen LIVE on LBREPORT.com, the City Council voted 9-0 on Aug. 5 to preserve pending further action (below) and not authorize destruction of multiple boxes of records from the Mayor's offices (1992-2009) and the 7th district Council offices (2002-2010).
Councilmembers Lena Gonzalez and Al Austin asked that the item be removed from the Council's "consent calendar" (where it was slated for approval without discussion unless specifically requested) and Councilwoman Gonzalez said the items could be important primary sources of city history. Gonzalez then made a motion, seconded by Austin, to direct the City Clerk to work with the Historical Society of LB on management of the records, perhaps digitize them, and report back to the Council in roughly thirty days.
From the podium, City Clerk Herrera thanked the Councilmembers for pulling the item for discussion "as well as the public for paying attention to our agenda. Putting this on the agenda serves its purpose where the public is notified consistent with the Long Beach Municipal Code Motion of records about to be destroyed, and we will hold those in abeyance until we come back to the Council."
The motion passed 9-0.
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On Aug. 2, LBREPORT.com was first (again) to report the impending agenda item that sought Council approval to destroy the records. On Aug. 4, retired Councilwoman Gerrie Schipske sent a dispatch via her OpenUpLongBeach.com opposing destruction of the records. To LBREPORT.com's knowledge, no other LB news outlet reported the item prior to its coming to the Council for action.
As agendized, two consent calendar items sought Council approval to destroy records from the Long Beach Mayor's office spanning the final two years of the administration of Mayor Ernie Kell (1992-1994), the entire tenture of Mayor Beverly O'Neill (1994-2006) and the first three years of Mayor Bob Foster (2006-2009) as well as the Seventh Council District office spanning the entire term of former Councilwoman Tonia Reyes Uranga (2002-2010), the first six months of the term of Councilman James Johnson (2010) and the final eighteen months of the term of Councilman Ray Grabinski (2000-2002).
State law and LB's Municipal Code enable -- but don't require -- the destruction of certain records.
Agenda items seeking Council authority to destroy records from non-elective, mainly bureaucratic offices are relatively mundane and show up periodically, but it's less common to see requests to destroy large numbers of records from the offices of the city's elected policysetting Councilmembers.
The Mayoral office documents, listed in an exhibit to the item's agendizing memo, are described as eight boxes of Mayoral records labelled "subject files" from 1992-2004 [Kell and O'Neill], Commission applications from 1999-2005 [O'Neill], constituent files 1999-2009 [O'Neill and Foster] and correspondence from 1999-2009 [O'Neill and Foster.]
The eight boxes of Mayoral documents were listed on a destruction notification report signed May 8, 2014 by a staffer in Mayor Foster's office, countersigned by a deputy city attorney on July 15; The commission applications, constituent files and correspondence were listed on a records destruction request approved by an outgoing staffer in Mayor Foster's office staffer on July 8, 2014 and countersigned by a deputy city attorney on July 15.
Nine boxes of 7th district files are described as four administrative files (2004-2010 and 2011), constituent files (2000-2003), three correspondence files (2003 and 2004-2009) and subject files (2003-2006). It was signed as received by outgoing 7th dist. Councilman James Johnson on July 10, 2014. The item is agendized as "Recommendation to approve the destruction of records for the Legislative Department, Seventh Council District; and adopt resolution."
