After observing numerous Freedom of Information Act violations by the Village of Rantoul over the past several months, Check CU began to investigate the Village’s past FOIA practices. We first inquired about the identities of past and current Village FOIA Officers. We also asked for all past FOIA Officer training certificates. The responses raise some serious concerns about the competency of Rantoul leadership.
FOIA Officer training is compulsory in the state of Illinois. Since 2010, state law has required every public body to designate one or more FOIA Officers, and those Officers must complete a training course provided by the Illinois Attorney General within 30 days of their appointment, and annually thereafter.
The Village of Rantoul did not designate any FOIA Officers after the law went into effect on January 1st, 2010. Records acquired from the Village on February 11th, 2022 show that FOIA Officers were not designated until June of 2021 – more than eleven years after state law required them to do so.
The records show that at their June 8th, 2021 Board meeting, the Village designated the following two individuals as FOIA Officers:
Village Clerk Janet E Gray – jgray@village.rantoul.il.us
Lieutenant Justin Bouse – JBouse@village.rantoul.il.us
On February 14th, Check CU asked for all Rantoul FOIA Officer Training Certificates. Village Clerk Janet Gray supplied the training certificates on February 22nd, but the certificates for FOIA Officers Gray and Bouse were dated February 15th and 16th – after our records request.
Gray and Bouse had never completed the state-required FOIA training, and appeared intent on ignoring the FOIA law until someone started asking questions. Check CU double-checked with the Village, inquiring about the past 20 years, Rantoul could not produce any records of anyone having completed FOIA training before we’d sent our inquiry on February 14th, 2022.
FOIA Officer Janet Gray served as the Past President of the Municipal Clerks of Illinois (MCI) before being elected to her current position as Rantoul Village Clerk. The MCI holds their own training events on improving “the delivery of local government services” with a focus on “continuous professional development”. They have sample FOIA Officer designation forms on their website, and they discussed the FOIA Officer training laws at their 2010 seminar. In the September 2010 issue of the Municipal Clerks of Illinois Magazine, they refer to the laws as “all those pesky new FOIA and OMA rules”.
FOIA Officer Justin Bouse, now the Deputy Chief of Police for the Rantoul Police Department, should also be very familiar with state law, but neither FOIA Officer complied with the training requirements. Rantoul Village Attorney David Wesner was also apparently unconcerned with or unaware of the lack of compliance.
The lack of FOIA training may explain why there have been so many Rantoul FOIA violations. The Village is currently being sued for improper denial of police records, and additional FOIA complaints are likely to arise in the near future.
