Morgantown sued by attorney representing former public works director

Ben Conley, The Dominion Post, Morgantown, W.Va.
·3 min read

May 21—MORGANTOWN — Charleston Attorney Sean Cook is suing the city of Morgantown over a Freedom of Information Act request tied to his representation of Alexandra Stockdale, who served as the city's public works director from November 2019 to October 2021.

Prior to the director position, Stockdale worked three years as the city's assistant engineer and, from May to September of 2019, as the interim director of the Morgantown Municipal Airport.

Cook is listed as the plaintiff on the suit filed May 16 in Monongalia County Circuit Court. In it he claims the city is being unreasonable and violating the requirements of the WVFOIA in stating it can respond to his April 12 request by Oct. 30.

According to the background provided in the suit, Stockdale resigned her employment with the city last fall "due to hostile work conditions that caused her physical and mental health to decline due to maltreatment from her coworkers."

The city contested Stockdale's application for unemployment benefits. Her application was initially denied by WorkForce West Virginia. That decision was reversed following a January hearing in which the WFWV Review Board said Stockdale left work with good cause and was not disqualified from receiving unemployment benefits.

Cook then filed a FOIA with the city seeking a list of materials dating back to 2019, including a transcript or notes taken by City Attorney Ryan Simonton during a phone call with Stockdale about an anonymous letter from a public works employee to the state ethics board related to Stockdale's engineering license.

It also requested all emails to and from Stockdale's city email address and all emails of any city employee that reference Stockdale by name or pronoun ; transcripts, recordings or notes of two personnel board hearings held in relation to grievances filed against Stockdale ; all documents related to the 2019 search and eventual hiring of the Morgantown Municipal Airport Director ; and a number of other materials.

Simonton responded to the April 21 FOIA request with an email explaining the city would have the documents ready by the end of October.

Cook says the FOIA statute is clear that the city has five days to respond to a FOIA. He makes that point in a series of emails with Simonton included in the case filing.

Simonton disagrees, explaining the city did respond to his request and that "The West Virginia Freedom of Information Act does not specify a particular time that records must be provided in response to a request."

Further, Simonton states, the seven-month timeline is fair given the "overly broad " nature of the request, which will require the city to gather and review thousands of documents in order to determine whether they reference Stockdale by name, pronoun or label.

"Although your request could have been denied, Morgantown instead accepted it and will provide you the records it locates after a reasonable search, " Simonton explained.

Cook is asking the court to declare the city's FOIA response unlawful and order the production of all the requested information "in a reasonable and timely manner."

Asked for comment, Morgantown Communications Director Andrew Stacy said the city does not comment on pending litigation.

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