The Public’s Radio — Stern warning from R.I. ACLU prompts changes to Weekapaug Fire District website

The sign near an entrance to a private boardwalk leading to the Quonochontaug Barrier Beach in the Weekapaug section of Westerly. Alex Nunes/The Public’s Radio

Oct 31, 2023

By Alex Nunes — The Westerly-based fire district, a taxing entity with government authorities but no fire department, had blocked information on its website from public view.

If you went on the website weekapaug.org for the first time earlier this year and sought access to information about the Weekapaug Fire District’s facilities and services, you were asked to provide an email and await a response to gain sign-in access to the website.

And if you aren’t a Weekapaug property owner, there’s a good chance you never received permission to view the information shielded by the quasi-municipal entity.

That’s different today.

A visitor to the website can now read about the fire district’s beaches, its “veteran security force,” the recipients of an award named for a watchman who saved four people in Weekapaug during the Hurricane of 1938, and a theater camp for kids where “[p]reference is given to Weekapaug residents.”

The change comes after the Rhode Island affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union sent the Weekapaug Fire District a letter dated Sept. 19, telling district officials, “Frankly, we have never before come across a government entity that hides information on its website from the general public, nor can we conceive of any lawful basis for doing so.”

The ACLU told the Weekapaug Fire District that information on the website “clearly is public and should therefore be readily accessible,” and that "it is unclear to us what purpose this secrecy serves.”

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