Tucson VA's record request denial is overruled after Star appeal

After the Tucson VA’s privacy office refused to release the names of the hospital’s current specialty staff, citing privacy concerns, the Star filed a formal appeal with the national VA system in June.

This month, general counsel for the national VA granted the Star’s appeal “in full,” stating the Tucson VA must release the names of those providers, which the Tucson VA did on Aug. 2.

“While we find that the dermatologists have a personal privacy interest in their identities, there is a countervailing public interest in knowing that VA employs qualified individuals,” wrote VA acting chief counsel Kenyatta McLeod-Poole in the decision letter. “As such, we find that public interest outweighs the privacy interests of the providers in this case.”

Tucson VA privacy officer Donna Wilson had initially released a list of the hospital’s four dermatology specialists, with all four names redacted. She argued that revealing their identities would violate the providers’ privacy.

“It is as likely as not that they would be contacted by the media as a result of this request,” Wilson said in her emailed response to the records request.

The Star appealed the VA’s denial to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ Office of General Counsel on June 15.

Dan Barr, counsel to the First Amendment Coalition of Arizona, called the initial denial from the local VA a “knee-jerk reaction” in expectation that the newspaper wouldn’t have the time or resources to fight it.

“I very much doubt the person who denied the request did any work to consider what the law was in the area,” Barr said. “A lot of public officials are counting on reporters not exercising their rights.”

When the Star first asked Tucson VA officials for the names of its current dermatology specialists, VA spokesman Steven Sample said a formal Freedom of Information Act request would be required to get that information.

PRIVACY ARGUMENT

Privacy officer Wilson said a veteran, not just the news media, would also have to file a formal public-records request to learn the identities of the VA’s medical staff.

The VA subsequently denied the Star’s records request in May, prompting the newspaper’s appeal to the national VA legal team.

A separate Star records request also sought the names of all the Tucson VA’s specialists, and the Star also submitted an almost identical appeal after the VA refused to release those names. The national VA’s legal counsel also agreed with the Star’s argument in that related appeal and provided an unredacted list of the requested specialists.

In both appeals, the Star argued any privacy concerns were outweighed by the need for transparency about the quality and quantity of specialists who care for the veteran community.

“Provider shortages at the VA have contributed to significant and widely reported wait-time problems at veterans’ hospitals across the U.S., to the outrage of veterans and veterans’ advocates,” the Star’s appeal said. “It is inarguably in the public interest for the Star, or a member of the public, including veterans themselves, to be able to determine at what level the local VA hospital is staffed by verifying the number of providers currently employed there.”

The Star also argued the Tucson veterans’ hospital contradicted its own privacy argument by publishing a public database of its providers on the VA website.

But that public database is two years out of date: A Star reporter determined at least one of the doctors listed in the database has since moved to Texas, which prompted the reporter to request the current staff listing from the VA.