The Massachusetts Army National Guard has agreed to pay the Association to Preserve Cape Cod (APCC) more than $26,000. The payment will settle a public records battle between the Guard and the environmental group over a failed plan to build a machine gun range at Joint Base Cape Cod.
APCC’s legal team pursued the settlement after arguing that the Guard did not comply with requests for public records relating to the range. Guard officials were forced to turn over the records after being taken to court.
A spokesperson for the Guard did not respond to a request for comment.
Andrew Gottlieb, executive director of APCC, said the settlement allows the Guard to avoid further court proceedings, and potentially higher penalties, over the records request issue.
“The court could have determined that they were subject to punitive fines for a lack of good faith,” he said.
There’s also a larger message, Gottlieb said.
“Part of our interest in publicizing this is to make it clear to the Guard and other public agencies that the law has real meaning, the records law has teeth,” he said. “And that at least one nonprofit organization, us, is fully prepared to go to court to ensure that we get access to the records that we're entitled to.”
Guard officials must make a request to the Comptroller of the Commonwealth to initiate the payment to APCC. It won’t cover the entire cost of APCC’s legal fees, Gottlieb said.
“This case still costs us money,” he said, “But it was worth every penny.”
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Find the settlement document here:
