City's ‘document dump' costs taxpayers thousands
<p>When Mayor Kasim Reed unleashed more than 400 boxes of documents, totaling 1.476 million documents pertaining to the city’s bribery investigation, it revealed just how many pieces of paper were included in this information dump.</p> <div> </div>
ATLANTA – When Mayor Kasim Reed unleashed more than 400 boxes of documents, totaling 1.476 million documents pertaining to the city’s bribery investigation, it revealed just how many pieces of paper were included in this information dump.
And that amount of paper will cost taxpayers nearly $6,500.
Here’s the breakdown:
- 1.476 million paper documents in information release to the media and public
- 1 tree = 8,333 sheets of paper
- 177 trees were killed to make this happen
- 2,952 reams of paper
- $21.99 for a box of paper
If a box of paper costs $21.99, the cheapest found, this document dump cost taxpayers $6487.05 in paper alone.
That price tag doesn’t include any manpower hours it took to print and put all of the documents together, as well as staff the room the documents are housed in with security.
The city hired the Baker Donelson law firm to produce the documents, and that firm contracted with an outside vendor to scan and print them.
The mayor's office has not provided an estimated cost for the documents.
Last month, Elvin Mitchell, owner of Cascade Building System and ER Mitchell Group, pleaded guilty to bribing unnamed city officials with more than $1 million in exchange for City of Atlanta construction contracts.
Charles P. Richards Jr., was charged after prosecutors alleged he paid more than $185,000 to city officials for contracts for his company, C.P. Richards Construction.
City officials accused of accepting these alleged bribes have not been named.
Multiple 11Alive crews were at City Hall for the release of the documents and news conference when Reed addressed the room.
Reed expressed his anger and frustration over the bribery scandal, which come at the tail end of his second term as Atlanta's mayor.
“We want every person who did wrong to be punished,” he said while standing in front of a wall of boxes containing only a fraction of the documents. “Wherever there is a problem, we want the problem rooted out.”
According to Reed, electronic copies of the 1.4 million pages from the office of former Department of Human Services head, Mitzi Bickers were provided to federal investigators, while members of the media were provided hard copies. Reed said that decision was made in order to protect any sensitive personal information contained in the paperwork, including social security numbers.
11Alive investigators will continue to sift through the documents and report on any developments in the coming days.
