That'll be $397.20

Posted by Magda
I've heard stories about newspapers being asked for astronomical amounts of money in response to a freedom of information request.

But it hadn't ever happened to me.

Until today.

I wrote a story last month about the city and county's disagreement regarding how much each should pay for Wellington Terrace, a seniors home. (The issue comes down to whether the city should pitch in for costs of building a new home, even though it's owned by the county.)

Today, I got a notice back that the documents had been found. With it came a price breakdown.

36 photocopies at 20 cents each = $7.20
Search and preparation of documents, at $7.50 for each 15 minutes (or $30 an hour) = $390
Total: $397.20

I called the city, thinking there was a typo in there somewhere. After all, it comes to a search time of 13 hours for those 36 pages.

But it turns out some of the documents are emails written by former staff members, which were stored on tape and had to be dug out.

I was told I could appeal the fee. I haven't yet decided how to proceed.

Comments

[Cam Guthrie]

Appeal it. That alone would be a story!

[Edward Pickersgill]

So is the seniors home one of those 80/20 decisions the County has every right to make as a result of its joint service agreement with the City. With the City paying 80% of all their joint transactions and the county in the driver's seat of such decisions its a very expensive realationship for the city. It may well be all the City can do to catch up is highway robbery on photocopies as it attempts to cover 80% of the buildings the County buys and develops inside Guelph.

Watching it for a few years now I'm reminded of several old yarns about city slickers getting taken to the cleaners by country boys (and gals) with muck on their boots, a gleam in their eyes and a dedication to garner one more great yarn at the expense of the "visitors".

[Magda]

Sorry for not responding to this earlier. It's not an 80-20 agreement -- the city has been paying the county $12.58 per day for each city resident staying in the home.