Photo by KELLY FARRELL
Marco's Planning Board should not get a Facebook page urges Nancy Stuparich, Planning Board attorney with the Miami-based firm Weiss Serota Helfman Pastoriza Cole & Boniske, P.L. Stuparich offered the board her advice at their last meeting in late June.
Photo by KELLY FARRELL
Staff
Marco's Planning Board should not get a Facebook page urges Nancy Stuparich, Planning Board attorney with the Miami-based firm Weiss Serota Helfman Pastoriza Cole & Boniske, P.L. Stuparich offered the board her advice at their last meeting in late June.
MARCO ISLAND — Social networking Web sites, such as Facebook, may be changing the face of participatory government.
Marco officials are looking at whether Facebook and Twitter may become a public records nightmare and whether they pose any challenges in public meeting requirements under Florida’s Government in the Sunshine Laws. Not all agree on the role, if any, that these sites should play in government.
Many Marco officials do agree, so far anyway, that the sites should be open to individuals’ use, but disagree on whether they should be used for city business or issues that would come in front of governing boards.
City Councilman Ted Forcht commented on how he uses Facebook and the content on his “wall,” as the main personal page on a Facebook account is called.
“I don’t really use Facebook in politics. I have some of my old pictures from my run posted just so if someone looks me up, they can see who or what they are voting for,” he wrote in a personal Facebook message to the reporter.
Forcht’s usage foreshadowed the possibility that Facebook may become an open arena for election candidates to freely share their stance on issues and garner support.
Nancy Stuparich, Planning Board attorney with the Miami-based law firm Weiss-Serota, advised the Planning Board at their meeting earlier in July that they should not have their own Facebook page.
“I would not recommend that the planning board get their own Facebook page under any circumstances,” agreed Tarik Ayusan, who serves on several boards and committees, including the Marco Island Charter Middle School board and Code Enforcement board.
He drew the line when it came to personal use by public officials.
“There are enough forums on the Island for the members to communicate with the residents.
“However, if the (Attorney General) or the Planning Board attorney is asking the members to shut down their Facebook or Twitter accounts, I am totally against it. This is the United States of America. Not China, Iran or N. Korea,” Ayusan wrote in a statement on the issue.
Council Chairman Rob Popoff, Forcht, Planning Board member Vince Magee and Ayusan are among the Island political figures using the sites. Several city employees are also on Facebook and their posts, which can be reviewed once they approve you as a “friend” on the site, have not been about city business.
“If any member of any board on Marco Island uses their Facebook account to communicate with other members of their board on city business, such action would be considered foolish at best and criminal at worst,” Ayusan stated, referencing the Sunshine Laws.
Magee said he just recently began using Facebook and the purpose is for personal use, not Planning Board business, which is evidenced in his recent posting Tuesday of family photographs which he described as “my life.”
Congressman Connie Mack (FL-14), who is on Facebook, frequently posts comments and information about his stance on political issues. A post Friday evening read: “voted against the cap-and-trade bill.”
Accompanying the posting was a link to the press release that went out earlier that day with his statement on the bill and why he voted the way he did.
Asked by the reporter to comment, via a Facebook message, on recent concerns about politicians and officials using the networking sites, Mack made this statement:
“Facebook and other forms of social networking media offer new and exciting ways for elected officials to communicate with their constituents. It gives me a chance to inform my constituents of my activities in Washington and in Southwest Florida, as well as hear from them about the pressing issues facing our region and our country.”
So far, there has been little direction from attorneys to individual board members about the use of Twitter, Facebook and MySpace.
City Attorney Alan Gabriel expected that to change.
“If the city official is using their personal computer to communicate city business then the city is required to maintain copies of those communications. In some cases, these communications and the management of these records become difficult, if not impossible. You can expect the state to adopt new legislation to address these very issues,” Gabriel said.
Public Information Coordinator Lisa Douglass said the City of Marco Island doesn’t currently have any accounts with Web sites, such as Facebook.
“I don’t foresee us having any in the future either,” she said.
The city’s decision not to exchange information via Facebook, MySpace and Twitter is because there are currently enough venues for information to be shared, Douglass added.
The warning coming from State Attorney General Bill McCollum’s April 23 opinion regarding Facebook and Florida’s Sunshine Laws to the city of Coral Springs is that the laws demand that officials keep all correspondence regarding official business, allowing any person to request to view those communications at any time.
“Thus, members of a city board or commission must not engage on the city’s Facebook page in an exchange or discussion of matters that foreseeably will come before the board or commission for official action,” McCollum wrote.
The State Attorney General’s Office has not formally been asked the same questions for Twitter as Facebook, but the same tests for determining what is a public record apply regardless of media type.
Stuparich reminded the Marco board that the Attorney General’s ruling must only be followed by the city requesting the opinion, and serves as directional only for other cities, including Marco Island, at this time.
Follow Marco Eagle reporter Kelly Farrell at twitter.com/kelfarrell or find at facebook.com/kelfarrell.
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