No public interest in disclosure of meeting minutes, BTA says
The Bermuda Tourism Authority has refused to disclose details of its board meetings, claiming it cannot understand how a request for them is in the public interest.
It rejected a public access to information request submitted by The Royal Gazette for all BTA board meeting minutes for the past 2½ years.
The quango’s refusal came despite a decision from Information Commissioner Gitanjali Gutierrez last year that said minutes were the type of record “public authorities routinely and proactively disclose” and taxpayers were entitled to access them for the “sake of transparency regarding a public authority’s governance”.
The BTA did reveal that it spent more than $100,000 in total on travel expenses last year for six employees: the chief executive officer, the chief operations officer and four vice-presidents.
The BTA’s information officer wrote on May 20 that the refusal to release the meeting minutes was on administrative grounds because disclosing the minutes would “cause a substantial and unreasonable interference with, or disruption of, the other work of the BTA”.
He said: “Further, and in any event, the BTA does not understand how this request could be in the genuine public’s interest, given that the relevant and material information regarding the BTA’s operations and finances is publicly disclosed in the BTA’s quarterly reports, published on its website.”
Earlier this year, the BTA released records of payments to its board members almost two years after the Gazette requested them, along with redacted minutes of meetings it previously insisted should remain secret.
The disclosure showed that American celebrity Terrence Jenkins, who was quietly appointed to the BTA by David Burt, the Premier, received $25,000 in director’s fees and attended four of 12 meetings held during his tenure.
The publicly funded body hired the law firm Carey Olsen to represent it after the newspaper asked Ms Gutierrez to review its initial response to the Pati request.
The information officer referred to that earlier Pati request in his May 20 letter, and said that it “visited a significant time and resource constraint on the BTA’s resources”.
He added: “Based on the BTA’s prior experience, complying with any request for the board meeting minutes of the BTA would be administratively burdensome; in particular, the timing and disruption involved for senior members of the BTA in order to review, redact and respond to correspondence received from The Royal Gazette.
“Additionally, the costs involved and the implications on the public purse as a result of legal advice to respond to Pati requests of this nature could potentially be substantial.”
Ms Gutierrez’s decision last year about meeting minutes was in relation to a Pati request from the Gazette to the Bermuda Gaming Commission.
The casinos and betting regulator claimed it was “vexatious” for the newspaper to ask for them.
Ms Gutierrez disagreed and said: “It is commonplace for public authorities to receive requests for their meeting minutes, or to be asked to publish them proactively.
“A request for meeting minutes, on its face, is made on legitimate grounds and not for any nuisance value.
“Because it is the type of record that public authorities routinely and proactively disclose, asking for access to meeting minutes objectively relates to the process for public access to information.”
She cited the Regulatory Authority and the Corporation of Hamilton as public authorities in Bermuda that publish meeting minutes online.
"Overall, the public interest in people knowing what matters the commission is working on at a particular time, as would be documented in meeting minutes, is evident and strong,“ the Information Commissioner wrote.
She agreed with the Gazette that meeting minutes were an excellent source of information, “which the public is entitled to access for the sake of transparency regarding a public authority’s governance”.
Ms Gutierrez noted that “public authorities may routinely update the public on [their] activities in other ways besides disclosing [their] board meeting minutes”.
The BTA publishes a quarterly activity corporate report but it does not detail the discussions held by board members, as its meeting minutes do.
Earlier this year, using information from BTA meeting minutes, the Gazettereported that Cabinet ministers agreed to pay British Airways $800,000 and grant it rebates on airport fees in exchange for the airline switching its popular London-Bermuda route to Heathrow.
The BTA’s response to the newspaper’s most recent Pati request included total travel expenditure for 2023 for board members, the CEO, COO and five VPs.
For chief executive Tracy Berkeley, the amount listed was $27,470, while for two of the VPs it was $30,824 and $30,634. The amount for the COO was $6,812 and for two other VPs it was $4,744 and $1,259.
There was no travel spending for board members or the fifth VP.
Also provided under Pati was board meeting attendance from January 2022 to February 2024, and payments to board members.
The disclosure confirmed that Mr Jenkins failed to attend both the January and February 2022 meetings of the BTA, before resigning on March 4, 2022. He was paid $5,000 for the first quarter of that year, as were all other members.
The BTA did not respond to a request for comment yesterday.
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