Etna Borough $600 CITATION NO. R0320721-2 for failure to remove snow and ice from sidewalks.

To Whom It May Concern:

Pursuant to Pennsylvania Right to Know Act, I hereby request the following records:

Attention Borough of Etna Freedom of Information Officer:

- Please provide a copy of CITATION NO. R0320721-2, with driver’s license number and birth date, as well as other information redacted, as required by the Pennsylvania Right To Know Law.

- As you recall, this is the $600 fine plus costs issued in March 2015, for failure to remove snow and ice from sidewalks.

- Please provide a copy of the Borough of Etna Ordinance No. 1266, “AN ORDINANCE AMENDING PREVIOUS ORDINANCES OF THE BOROUGH OF ETNA DEALING WITH THE REMOVAL OF SNOW AND ICE FROM SIDEWALKS WITHIN THE BOROUGH OF ETNA”, which law this CITATION NO. R0320721-2, was purported to have violated.

- Ordinance No. 1266 was enacted on the 20th day of April 1999.

The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes.

In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 5 business days, as the statute requires.

Sincerely,

Helena J. Csorba

Attention Borough of Etna Freedom of Information Officer:

There has been no fee requested for these Freedom of Information request documents.

Mary Ellen Ramage, the Borough of Etna Manager and Freedom of Information Officer is reticent in sending these documents because she will be found out, that once again she was trying to extort onerous, excessive and punitive fines for this citation also. The Authority by Law, by which the Borough of Etna Codes and Ordinances for Section 1266 allows, is only up to and no more than $100 penalty. The Citation was written for a demand of $600.

Please post the response to my Freedom of Information request. You have used all kinds of delay tactics, including the Borough of Etna's solicitor's time that is paid for by, us, the taxpayers. We have the right to know the Borough of Etna Laws, Codes and Ordinances.

Please respond to the Freedom of Information request.
.

3 07 2017
Attention Borough of Etna Freedom of Information Officer:

There is no fee requested for this Freedom of Information request for the Borough of Etna $600 CITATION NO. R0320721-2, for failure to remove snow and ice from sidewalks.

Please respect the integrity of each FOIA request as an isolated matter, to be treated with individual responses. Legally, each FOIA request, is a request unto itself and should be responded to as such and should be kept separate. They are not a 'Shake'nBake' and should not be treated as such.

Mary Ellen Ramage, the Borough Manager, the Freedom of Information Officer, is on some 'heady-trip' and under some delusions of grandeur, pretending that she is not an employee of the Borough of Etna taxpayers, which includes me.

As an added note, all fees have been paid, to date, that were due, but that has nothing to do with this particular Freedom of Information request. If the Freedom of Information Officer is referring to the $401.50 extortion fee requested for the FOIA request as below –- that has been marked ‘COMPLETED’. Please refer to that request here https://www.muckrock.com/foi/etna-27363/borough-of-etna-codes-and-ordinances-laws-and-rules-and-enforcement-procedures-including-associated-fines-as-allowable-by-law-30286/ or for your convenience, my last correspondence regarding that FOIA request is as below:

#####
03/05/2017
From: Helena J. Csorba

Subject: RE: Right to Know Request: Borough of Etna Codes and Ordinances, Laws and Rules and Enforcement Procedures, including associated fines as allowable by law.

Attention Borough of Etna Freedom of Information Officer:

I am going to mark this Freedom of Information request as 'COMPLETED' because even though the Freedom of Information Officer has been informed that I will have a scanning crew go to the Etna borough building and scan the Codes and Ordinances, Laws and Rules and Enforcement Procedures, including associated fines as allowable by law, in their entirety and put them on-line, for all to review and for all to view; Mary Ellen Ramage is holding the other Freedom of Information requests' responses 'hostage' for this big 'pay-day' of $401.50, a reward, that I am sure she has charged multiple times before, for these documents.

Each Freedom of Information request is a legal document and a request unto its own and should be treated as such and responded to as such. Mary Ellen Ramage is just playing a ‘delaying game’.

Mary Ellen Ramage, the borough manager, has been found out to be charging excessive and illegal fines, that are not within the Borough of Etna's Authority. Publishing the Borough of Etna Codes and Ordinances and the Authority under which they operate, would reveal that.

I think a thorough audit is in order, as I do not believe, I am the only one that is feeling the financial sting of repeated $1000 citation fines.
#####

Please respond to this Freedom of Information request for the Borough of Etna $600 CITATION NO. R0320721-2, for failure to remove snow and ice from sidewalks.

This CITATION was written for six-times more than allowable by the Borough of Etna's own Ordinance Code, Section 1266, Law and Authority.

The Freedom of Information Officer, Mary Ellen Ramage, a.k.a. the Borough of Etna Manager needs to respond to this FOIA and post the CITATION NO. R0320721-2 for the whole world to see, that the Borough is raising revenue by issuing illegal, onerous, extrajudicial, financially burdensome fines, Ferguson, Missouri-style.
..

To Whom It May Concern:
I wanted to follow up on the following request, copied below. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response.
Thanks for your help, and let me know if further clarification is needed.