June 14–21, 2001

hall monitor

Disk-y Business

On May 3, Hall Monitor reported that the city commissioner was refusing to hand over public information to a website on local politics because the data was requested on computer disk. Now, Mayor Street is ignoring the website’s requests for campaign finance reports in electronic form.

Ed Goppelt, who made the requests, says he is prepared to file a lawsuit if that’s what it takes to make Philadelphia officials adhere to the law.

The controversy began in April, when Goppelt tried to post information about polling places on his nonprofit website, Hallwatch.org. Currently, the portal allows users to search campaign finance reports filed by City Council members and Mayor Street, as well as look up pending legislation and public hearing dates.

For nearly two months, City Commissioner Marge Tartaglione has ignored Goppelt’s request for an electronic version of Philadelphia’s Ward Division book, even though it is clearly public information. And the disk exists, as evidenced by the fact that the Kennedy Printing Company sells it.

Goppelt’s lawyer, Sam Stretton, sent the commissioners two letters, dated May 8 and June 4, threatening a lawsuit if they refuse to provide the polling-place data in electronic form. Stretton has not received a reply to either letter and says he is confident a judge would rule in Goppelt’s favor.

During a phone conversation Monday, Deputy City Commissioner Ed Schulgen initially denied ever receiving any mail from Stretton. Moments later, however, he apparently discovered the two letters sitting in his office.

"Oh, they’re here, but I didn’t see them until just now," said Schulgen, a staff attorney who doubles as PR flack for the commissioners.

Schulgen is uncertain whether his office plans to respond to the letters.

"It is up to the commissioners, and they haven’t asked my opinion," he said. "They are not here now, and there are no meetings scheduled in the near future." (Apparently, calling Tartaglione is not an option).

Now, the mayor’s office is putting Goppelt through a similar rigmarole by ignoring his requests for campaign finance reports in electronic form.

The documents were easy enough to get on paper, Goppelt says. But typing in thousands of campaign donations is time-consuming and risks accuracy. Goppelt and his girlfriend are determined, however — they manually entered 730 separate contributions made to Street during 2000.

Goppelt finds this situation particularly ironic, in light of comments Street submitted to the Inquirer’s Citizens Voices project during his 1999 mayoral campaign. Street told the Inquirer "tools exist that give the public a greater opportunity to monitor political contributions and government contracting…My campaign provided information to the [Daily News] on disk to facilitate its reporting. I will continue to do so. And as mayor, I will make available to the public and the press, on the Internet and in a computer-compatible format, contracting reports, including the names and businesses awarded city contracts. While the City has its own policing mechanism…the public has its own right to know."

But after writing three letters to Street and stopping by his City Hall office, Goppelt hasn’t received a reply.

"I was told [Secretary of External Affairs] George Burrell was handling this, but I’ve never gotten a call," he says.

Mayoral spokeswoman Luz Cardenas did not return calls for comment.

Goppelt is not alone in his failed effort to obtain Street’s campaign finance information on disk. He recently spoke to an official at the Pennsylvania election bureau who told him Street was contacted four months ago about filing an "amended" disk, as the one he originally submitted was unreadable. Street’s office has yet to follow through.

—Gwen Shaffer