An appeals court has upheld an April 2023 lower court ruling finding that Bucks County acted in “bad faith” when it refused to turn over documents to a resident who’d won access in open records cases.
The case dates back to the Covid-19 pandemic when Megan Brock, a mother with school-age children, filed right-to-know requests seeking communications about the Bucks County Health Department’s pandemic guidance.
Specifically, Brock was seeking emails from August 2021, when the county suddenly overrode Covid-19 guidance issued by its own Health Department Director, Dr. David Damsker, who said the science indicated more parent-friendly, less-restrictive policies. Instead, Bucks County bureaucrats replaced Damsker’s rules with stricter state guidelines for masking, quarantines, and vaccinations…