NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- NSBNEWS.net made a public information request from the city for a breakdown of costs between what individual municipal employees made in base pay and what they grossed during the 2009 fiscal year that ended Sept. 31. The initial request made Monday with Finance Director Carol Rogers went unanswered Friday.
NSBNEWS.net followed up with a second request Wednesday with City Clerk Johnny Bledsoe.
Rogers agreed to have the request done by Friday at the latest, but that she would have to be paid since she would have to do the research. Asked if there was any report or cost analysis between the base and gross pays for each of the city's 247 employees paid in fiscal 2009 and she said there was not. She said she could provide such a report at a cost that would not exceed $300.
Bledsoe said Wednesday there might be a possibility there would be no charge, but that NSBNEWS.net might have to do its own calculations if given raw data by the city.
Rogers was not at work Thursday or Friday. Bledsoe said he contacted her office Friday afternoon and was told she had been off the two days and the work was not assigned to anyone else.
Bledsoe apologized to NSBNEWS.net and said he would re-submit the Web site's public information request again to Rogers' office before the end of the business day.
Bledsoe said he doubted anyone else in Finance would be able to get to the request Friday afternoon because staff there was busy coordinating with other offices for a move by city administrators from the Administrative Office Building on the North Causeway to City Hall, a move that is expected to take a couple of weeks to complete.
Mayor Sally Mackay, who was campaigning Friday afternoon for her re-election bid, said she was unaware of NSBNEWS.net's request when contacted by the Web site provider and said she wouldn't have any authority in getting the information sought by NSBNEWS.net with the business day drawing to a close.
Without the statistics from the city, NSBNEWS.net is unable to fulfill its mission in informing the public about the breakdown of municipal salaries and analysis. Our series is important because thecity for the past two fiscal years has spent in exccess of $2 million in reserves to approve each of its fiscal budgets, with most of the budget earmarked in municipal salaries.
NSBNEWS.net wants the salary breakdowns between the basic pay and the gross pay to it can ascertain why some employees actually made upwards of $50,000 extra. For example, City Attorney Grank Gummey's base salary was $185,744, but his gross was $216,170.70. That's a difference of $30,373.70.
Florida's public records laws are clear that public information is to be provided in a timely manner after a request has been made. In this case, not one, but two public requests were made. The information sought is clearly part of the public record.