If a motion filed Friday is upheld in court, an anti-illegal immigration group may be derailed in its quest for personal data of those who hold the city’s immigrant-friendly ID card.
Journalist Chris Powell and the Community Watchdog Project, a group opposed to illegal immigration, are appealing a decision by the state Freedom of Information Commission not to reveal names and addresses of the 5,000-plus people who have signed up for New Haven’s immigrant-friendly municipal ID card since its launch last July.
The FOIC made a move to block that appeal. In a motion for dismissal filed Friday in New Britain Connecticut Superior Court, the FOIC argues that the appeal should be thrown out because the watchdog group missed a 45-day time-limit to file an appeal.
Click here and here to read the motion for dismissal and accompanying memo.
The watchdog group, led by Dustin Gold, retained local attorney Patty Cofrancesco to carry out the FOIC appeal.
“By the time we were able to secure a local attorney, we were on a very, very limited time frame of a few days and Patty was able to do the best that she could do to notify the parties and file with the court,” Gold said in response to the motion for dismissal.
Meanwhile, Gold said his group is putting together a federal discrimination suit against the city related to the ID card program.
“If something happens on the appeal of the Freedom of Information case, it’ll free up some money” to work on the discrimination case, he said. Gold said his group also has a series of additional FOI requests pending with Mayor John DeStefano.
“We’ll continue to fight the mayor,” Gold said, “until he changes his policy or he’s thrown out of office.”