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Amount of funds and their allocation among local and central media paid by the Municipality of Lovech for different announcements

Naroden Glas newspaper vs. the Municipality of Lovech

First Instance – adminiustrative case No. 138/2007 in Administrative Court of Lovech (ACL)

Request:
On May 18, 2007, Tsvetan Todorov, editor in chief of Naroden Glas newspaper submitted a request to the mayor of the Municipality of Lovech to obtain access to the following information:

Information on the amount of funds spent for publication of advertisements in local and central mass media for the period 2004 – 2006 out of the municipal budget;
Informaiton on how the funds were allocated among the the respective publishers –numerically;
Information on who and how identified which publisher shall print the advertisement. What were the selection criteria?

Refusal:
On June 2, 2007, the mayor of the municipality notified the requestor that the requested information would affect the interests of third parties, and that was necessary to obtain their consent for the disclosure, thus the term for providing an answer was extended to 14 days. Subsequently, with a decision as of June 15, 2007, the mayor of the municipality provided to the requestor the information on the lump sum spent by the municipality for publications in mass media. He, however, refused to provide numerical information about the allocation of that money since the third parties concerned had sent written dissent for the disclosure of the information. The requestor was informed that the municipal administration was publishing advertisements in different media using the best price offers as the criteria for selection.

Complaint:
The refusal was challenged before the Administrative Court of Lovech (ACL). The complaint stated that it was not in the interest of the administration to keep the information on how public funds were spent from the society. The budget and the way it was allocated, including the municipal budget, was a public matter. The law itself provided for a balance in favour of the citizens’ right to know how public funds were spent.

Developments in the Court of First Instance:
By the end of 2007, three court hearings took place since it turned out that the municipal administration itself did not really know who had been contacted in regard to the advertisements and who exactly received the public money. In order to clarify this matter, it was necessary to hold three court hearings and the Administrative Court of Lovech even took the measures of imposing a sanction to the municipality legal advisor for non fulfillment of court instructions in time. During the last hearing, it was found out that there no contracts had been signed between the municipality and the four media, which had expressed dissent for disclosure of the amount of money they had received from the budget. During the forth court hearing in January 2008, one of the third persons – Novinar newspaper, provided a protocol for the amount of money received from the Municipality of Lovech for publishing advertisements and announcements during the specified period. In February 2008, the last court hearing was held and the case was scheduled for judgement.

A court decision is pending.