Collier County Commissioner Bill McDaniel has apparently been conducting a lot of county business on his personal email account — and now taxpayers will be footing the bill to defend him in a lawsuit filed by a local golf course over it.
The commission voted Tuesday for the county to provide legal representation for McDaniel in a lawsuit filed by Naples Golf, which owns the Links of Naples golf course on Tamiami Trail in east Collier, alleging the commissioner failed to turn over some 350,000 private emails that he has generated while conducting public business during his seven years in office.
The county recently agreed to turn over the public emails to Naples Golf Development LLC, which is in a development dispute with McDaniel, but only if the company first pays the county $57,244.77 for a review of the emails for possible redactions.
Naples Golf attorney Ethan Loeb called the exorbitant fee “offensive” and said it falls outside the bounds of Florida’s public records laws.
“It’s an impediment to obtaining public records,” said Loeb. “I think it’s over the top.”
McDaniel, however, made a stunning admission in an interview with the Florida Trident after Tuesday’s vote that appears to make the county’s steep monetary demand even more egregious.
“There’s nothing to redact in the emails,” said McDaniel. “They’re already in the public server and there’s no redactions to be made.”
Loeb asked the obvious question: If there is nothing to redact in the records why is the county trying to force his client to pay $57,244.77 for alleged redactions?
“It makes no sense,” he said.
Making the demand even more curious is that Collier County Attorney Jeffrey Klatzkow initially offered in an October 26 email to hand over the McDaniel emails with no listed fees if Loeb agreed to end the lawsuit.
It was only after Loeb told the county he wasn’t ending the lawsuit that officials sent Loeb the five-figure demand for the records. A call for comment from Klatzkow left with the county was not returned prior to publication.
"It’s an impediment to obtaining public records. I think it’s over the top.”Naples Golf attorney Ethan Loeb on a $57,244 public records fee
It's sad to see it go down this way,” said Loeb. “You expect your government to be a little more transparent and not play what I would refer to as games.”
About the Author: Bob Norman is an award-winning investigative reporter who serves as Editor-in-Chief of the Florida Trident and journalism program director for the Florida Center for Government Accountability. He can be reached at journalism@flcga.org.