When Michigan State University officials refused to comment on a plagiarism investigation directed at a professor, Michael Van Beek decided to put in a Freedom of Information Act request to find out what was going on.
Van Beek, the education policy director at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, discovered the alleged plagiarism in a MSU study last year. He was shocked to find out what was returned by MSU in answer to the FOIA request. There was a two-page e-mail completely redacted as well as entire paragraphs from other e-mails where little was left except the person’s name, title and contact information.
“It basically is a useless document that they gave us back,” Van Beek said. “If this is meeting a FOIA request, it definitely changes the expectations of how public bodies can be held accountable through FOIA.”
In one instance, an e-mail states: “Bob, I am concerned about (redacted). It is certainly (redacted). Can we talk about this. I think it will not (redacted). Moreover, (redacted). Moreover, it demonstrates (redacted).”
Patrick Wright, senior legal counsel for the Mackinac Center said the FOIA’ed documents look “fairly ridiculous.” Wright said the Mackinac Center is reviewing its legal options.
One FOIA expert said redaction has become more prevalent.
Robin Luce-Herrmann, general counsel for the Michigan Press Association, handles media problems with FOIA.
“One of the more frequent problems now is redaction,” Luce-Herrmann said. “Redaction wasn’t something I was being called about as much three to four years ago.”
The Mackinac Center for Public Policy alleged that Sharif Shakrani, senior scholar at the Education Policy Center at MSU and a professor of measurement and quantitative methods, plagiarized more than 800 words in a study about school consolidation. The study was later amended to acknowledge the sources Shakrani used for his report that weren’t previously included.
MSU launched an investigation last fall that it said could take a year to complete.
To see a few select excerpts from the FOIA response, click here or here.
To see the full FOIA response, click here.
Michigan Capitol Confidential is the news source produced by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Michigan Capitol Confidential reports with a free-market news perspective.
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Extending Exemptions
In a recent appearance on the Frank Beckmann radio show where I discussed Gov. Rick Snyder's proposed business tax cut and reforms, the issue of taxing pension income arose. A number of retired government employees phoned in strenuously objecting to any income tax on their pensions.
What many listeners may not have realized is that Michigan currently provides a 100 percent income tax exemption for government retirement benefits, but the exemption is capped for benefits earned by retirees who worked in the private sector.
That this is unfair is recognized even by some liberal Democratic politicians such as former state Sen. Mickey Switalski, who introduced a bill last year to extend the 100 percent income tax exemption to pension benefits from private employers as well as government ones.
That reform will be much easier if the state enacts policies that bring about $5.7 billion in potential savings that Mackinac Center research suggests are possible by indexing government employee fringe benefits to private-sector averages. Specifically, state, local, university and K-12 employees receive benefits every year worth $5.7 billion more than those averaged by employees the private sector — and that's a conservative estimate.
Fixing this imbalance would save enough to eliminate a projected $1.8 billion spending-over-revenue state budget gap, repeal the $2.2 billion Michigan business tax and surcharge, spend an additional $1.7 billion fixing roads, save for a rainy day or ... extend to private sector retirees the same tax breaks enjoyed by those who were employed by governments. All without cutting a single government program or laying off a single employee.
Not that there isn't room for slimming government programs and payrolls. A 2003 Mackinac Center study identified 200 recommendations for saving $2 billion. Subsequent research has found many more that every year could save taxpayers additional hundreds of millions.
Michigan Capitol Confidential is the news source produced by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Michigan Capitol Confidential reports with a free-market news perspective.
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