information 
and 
digest 
it 

and disseminate it to the 
public, and this is that kind 
of circumstance,” Eaton said. 
“This particular Freedom of 
Information Act request asked 
for the location of everywhere 
in the city that the city has 
removed 
lead 
gooseneck 

connections from the water 
main to the home’s supply 
line, and it also asks for the 
location of every home that 
has galvanized pipe from the 
water main at the street to the 
house.”

The decision to release 

the 
information 
comes 

after the state put stricter 
lead 
regulations 
in 

place. 
In 
June, 
Michigan 

started enforcing the toughest 
laws in the country for lead 
levels 
in 
drinking 
water 

following 
the 
Flint 
water 

crisis, in which the city’s 
thousands of residents have 
been exposed to lead from the 
city’s water pipes. The rules 
dropped the “action level” 
at which utilities must take 

corrective action from the 
federal limit of 15 parts of 
lead per billion to 12 ppb by 

2025. The rules prohibited 
the partial alteration of lead 
pipes save for emergencies, 
while lead service lines buried 
underground are set to be 
switched out by 2040.

According to city officials, 

all known lead elements have 
been taken out of Ann Arbor’s 
water 
system. 
However, 

galvanized supply lines that 
remain in place could still 
retain 
lead, 
which 
could 

contaminate drinking water.

Eaton said the location of 

the lead goosenecks the city 
has replaced should be “readily 
available.” He added he did not 
believe the city should charge 
the newspaper for the costs 
involved in completing a list 
of these locations when he felt 
the city should have compiled 
the list itself anyway.

City Administrator Howard 

Lazarus said he worried about 
the precedent this would set 
for future FOIA requests, 
saying covering the cost could 

change the intention of 
future requests.

“While I recognize the 

intent of Councilmember 
Eaton’s 
desire, 
there 

are very real concerns 
about this,” Lazarus said. 
“Many times we hear 
council talk about the 
slippery slope. This is a 
slippery slope. The ability 
to recover costs from a 
FOIA request is in many 
ways a counter that keeps 
the FOIA process from 
being used as punitive 
and disruptive, and these 
$400 is something that a 
for-profit such as MLive 
ought to be able cover and 
it is, in fact, consistent 
with past practice.”

Lazarus 
rejected 
a 

fee waiver in October, 
maintaining the $667.94 
was 
necessary 
to 

reimburse 
Ann 
Arbor 

for the time the city’s 
public services manager 
would have to dedicate to 
locating the information. 

However, the Ann Arbor News 
argued the law bars a public 
entity from charging more 
than the hourly pay of the 
lowest-paid employee capable 
of 
handling 
the 
request. 

The city then dropped the 
fee to $409.71 and assigned 
a 
different 
employee 
to 

complete the task.

Both Councilmember Julie 

Grand, D-Ward 3, and City 
Attorney 
Stephen 
Postema 

echoed 
Lazarus’s 
concerns 

about waiving the FOIA fee, 
saying continuing to do so 
for other requests would be 
untenable. 
Councilmember 

Chip 
Smith, 
D-Ward 
5, 

added an amendment to the 
resolution to waive the FOIA 
fee to make the compiled 
information 
suitable 
for 

distribution to all of the 
public, as opposed to just 
being provided to MLive.

Transparency 
in 
city 

government 
has 
been 
a 

campaign 
issue 
of 
City 

Council 
candidates 
for 

years, 
and 
the 
council 

has debatedFOIA fee waivers 
in the past. Councilmember 
Ali Ramlawi, D-Ward 5, said 
there was a greater urgency 
for government transparency 
after the Flint water crisis. 

“Many in the community 

are 
asking 
for 
greater 

transparency 
and 
greater 

public safety in light of what 
happened in Flint,” Ramlawi 
said.

Councilmember Elizabeth 

Nelson, D-Ward 4, said she 
had heard concerns among 
residents about the lack of 
information.

“I 
think 
it 
would 
be 

helpful,” Nelson said. “It’s 
probably information that the 
city had to compile anyway, 
and making it public would 
be useful to know what time 
period of homes is most likely 
to be affected, if there are 
patterns to which homes had 
this problem address already 
or still need it to be addressed.”

SANTA VISITS KE RRY TOWN

2A — Monday, November 26, 2018
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
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“Many in the 
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are demanding 

greater 

transparency 
and greater 
public safety”

