A nonprofit organization seeking public records from the Rapides Parish School District over a religious book distributed at a Pineville elementary school was told it would have to pay $2 million for copies of what was requested.
Superintendent Jeff Powell later told the attorney who requested the records the original request was "very broad" and that he was confident the request could be fulfilled for much less. Powell also has placed on item on the July 2 regular meeting agenda to address the costs for requesting records.
The request follows the distribution of a religious book targeted to teens, "The Life Book," that was given to Lessie Moore Elementary School students in April by Journey Church members during a "Together Tuesday" event. A parent of a Lessie Moore student complained to the Freedom From Religion Foundation, a nonprofit that advocates for the separation between church and government.
"The Life Book" is given to churches by Gideon International free upon request. It features fictional characters reading or discussing Bible passages for teens. The entire book can be found on the internet, too.
The parent, whose child did not take a book but who heard about its contents from other students, was upset about a portion of the book that deals with premarital sex. The foundation alleged that kids began referring to it as "the sex book."
The book was collected from students the same day. Journey Pastor James Greer had no comment on the book distribution when asked by The Town Talk on June 5.
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The school district issued a statement on May 17 that said it had not received a complaint from any parent in Rapides Parish, but noted the complaint received by a group it did not name.
Hirsh Joshi is the foundation attorney who filed the complaint on behalf of the parent, and he also filed the records request on May 3.
In it, he asked the district to provide him with all communications — emails, texts and any other form of written communication — about the book distribution between district and Lessie Moore staffs, between Lessie Moore staff members and between district employees and Journey Church.
Joshi provided specific dates and key phrases to search, including "the Life Book," "the Sex Book," "Journey Church" or "Church." He also sought all complaints, anonymous or not, made to the district's administration or to Lessie Moore about the distribution.
He said the district replied on June 12, quoting him a price of almost $2 million, based on a price of $1 per page. But Joshi also wrote that he could find nothing on the district's website to back up that charge.
"It appears RPSD does not actually have a publicly available policy on the cost of pages in an open records request," he wrote. "The $1 per page figure seems entirely made up. However, we welcome any public link that supports RPSD’s policy of charging $1 per page."
He also stated that perhaps including the word "the" in searches inflated the price.
Powell responded on June 21, saying his assistant had tried multiple times to call Joshi during the attempts "to process your original, very broad, records request," but she never got an answer to those calls.
But the superintendent said, in a response provided to The Town Talk by Joshi, the district would be happy to fulfill the records request and was "confident" what he sought would be much smaller — and less expensive.
Powell has placed on item on the July 2 regular meeting agenda "to revise and add records request fee schedule" to an existing policy on administrative records.
Louisiana's public records law was changed in mid-June when Gov. Jeff Landry signed a bill that essentially releases public officials from personal liability if they withhold records or fail to meet deadlines to respond to records requests.
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