June 1, 2009

Dear Commissioner David Lakey,

I am writing to inform you of serious misconduct among your staff at the Mental Health and
Substance Abuse (MHSA) Division in response to my request for certain records that I
submitted on May 18th.

In response to previous records requests that I made prior to May 18th, I received letters dated
May 7th and 15th from Assistant Commissioner Michael Maples and his assistant Mimi McKay
stating that all of the requested records (local school district Texas School Surveys for years
1988 through 1995) are being stored in small archive boxes (each containing approximately 1.5
cubic feet in volume) in an off-site warehouse, where they have already been reviewed by DSHS
staff who are familiar with the surveys. On May 15th, Ms. McKay through her legal assistant
Sherry Mansell led me to believe that all of the requested documents were being stored in each
of the 50 archive boxes located on two pallets in a warehouse storage facility (See Exhibit 1,
page 6 & Exhibit 2). I requested further clarification on May 19th without any response back
from Ms. McKay or her staff.

On May 18th, I requested a maximum of five hours of time to inspect all requested survey
documents, including those contained in each of the 50 small archive boxes, minus the time it
will take for DSHS staff to simply transfer them to the nearest space that will accommodate my
request (See Exhibit 3). Because each survey book is easily identifiable in the archive boxes (i.e.
the books are about a hundred pages thick with comb plastic binding and the front cover clearly
titled), I informed Ms. McKay that I do not want DSHS to spend any personnel time further
reviewing any of the 50 archive boxes on the two pallets. Nevertheless, I still received a notice
on May 29th from Ms. McKay that providing the requested boxes would require 7 hours of staff
time to "designate the boxes that contain responsive year documentation for you request and
move those boxes to a space that will accommodate your request to work on these
documents." (See Exhibit 4) I considered this a large amount of unnecessary staff time, so I
requested an exact break down of the 7 hours and that was the best she could provide to me.

Moreover, when I requested simple confirmation on May 18th of the exact address of the
warehouse storage facility containing the requested archive boxes (I suspected it was the DSHS
Warehouse on the Central Complex), I did not receive the following response back from Ms.
McKay until May 29th:

It is my understanding that at this time these materials are located on two pallets in a
part of the service building (400 on this map:
http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/visitor/complex.shtm) that has minimal air conditioning
and no table/electrical outlets in that immediate area. (See Exhibit 5)

I do not know why, when or for what purpose, Ms. McKay had all 50 archive boxes transferred
from the DSHS warehouse to an abandoned lab facility (service building 400) without my
knowledge or authorization.
Ms. McKay’s response also seems to indicate that the boxes may be transferred to other
undisclosed locations at a later time. Considering that these archive boxes could easily be
transferred to Room 208 in the Service Building adjacent to the Print Shop according to facility
personnel, Ms. McKay’s actions are wasting personnel time, further delaying compliance to my
open records request, and are a deviation from state law mandating prompt access to public
information for requestors.

Based on my past experience with MHSA Division staff and their obstructive manner in
approaching my open records requests (as will be described at length below), I strongly suspect
that the boxes and the requested contents are being tampered with in some fashion by their
staff. I suspect that is the reason why it took so long for Ms. McKay to identify the current
location of the boxes, while still failing to reveal the warehouse location of origination. I also
believe that is the reason why I have yet to receive the requested inventory worksheets that
would identify and track the archive boxes containing the requested survey documents.

For my personal records, I need to obtain all official inventory documentation that DSHS staff
has used during the past 60 days to identify and track all local school district Texas School
Surveys. I also need all documentation confirming requisitions and deposits during the past 60
days at the DSHS warehouse of any local school district Texas School Surveys.

Another important matter is that since my first May 12th inspection request, I have yet to
receive any DSHS procedures that state how I will be provided the requested information in the
least costly method, even though the DSHS website states the following:

All governmental bodies responding to information requests have the responsibility to:

- Establish reasonable procedures for inspecting or copying public information and

inform requestors of these procedures;

http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/sa/OpenRecords.shtm

Over the past year, there has been difficulty with every person assigned by the MHSA Division
to process my open records requests. Israel Garza, under Ms. McKay’s direction, repeatedly
denied having the responsive information to my records requests on at least three occasions
only for me to find out to the contrary. Last year on April 30, 2008, he denied repeatedly that
DSHS had any Texas School Surveys responsive to request for the document produced during
years 2002 through 2006. (See Exhibit 6) In response, I had to file a complaint letter with the
Texas Attorney General's office to have Mr. Garza release the information. In response to two
consecutive open records requests for Texas School Surveys, their contractor at Texas A&M
University (Public Police Research Institute - PPRI) each time attempted to obtain an exemption
from public disclosure from the Texas Attorney General. On October 8 and 9th, 2008, I also
requested a copy of the 1989 San Antonio ISD Texas School Survey from Mimi McKay only to
have been told that they did not have it (See Exhibit 7). On April 28 and 29, 2009, Mr. Garza
initially denied several times that DSHS has any local school district Texas School Surveys from
years 1988 through 1995 along with any methodology reports that accompany the statewide
version of the Texas School Survey for years 1988 through 2008 (See Exhibits 8 & 9). I
eventually received some of the methodology reports from Ms. McKay and their Texas A&M
contractor but not the ones from years 1988 and 1990. After I requested documentation of the
disposal of any 1988 – 1995 local school district Texas School Surveys, Mr. Garza, Ms. McKay
and their supervisor Michael Maples finally confirmed their existence in 50 archive boxes at the
DSHS warehouse and revealed that they have people in their department who knew all along
about the surveys. (Exhibit 1, page 6) I am aware that one of them is Dr. Liang Liu, the author of
the biannual statewide survey, Texas School Survey of Substance Use, since 1992.

I believe that these obstructive and wasteful practices on the part of MHSA Division staff need
to be brought to your attention. I am also requesting that a representative from your office
take custody of all documents that I have requested and closely supervise the remainder of my
unfulfilled open records requests.

I would like to expedite my records requests as soon as possible. Please let me know how we
can best proceed forward with this. If you need additional information from me, please do not
hesitate to respond back to me in writing via email. Thank you for your attention to this urgent
matter.

Sincerely,

Craig Johnson

Enclosed:
Exhibits 1 – 9