Comments (0) Best Public Records Custodian - 2001
Jeff Samuels
Florida citizens enjoy unparalleled access to government documents -- our Sunshine Law is the most comprehensive in the nation. But the people whose job it is to hand over the documents are a mixed lot. Some are helpful, some are incompetent, some delight in their ability to obfuscate and complicate. And then there's Jeff Samuels, public records guy extraordinaire. The last time we called him to look at a file, Samuels said he was really busy and it might take a while. "How long?" we replied, expecting to be put off for weeks. When he answered, "Is tomorrow OK?" we nearly swallowed our No. 2 pencil. On another occasion, after we had copied some documents, Samuels called the next day to report that he'd done a quality check on our request and discovered that we'd been overcharged by 60 cents. They just don't come any better.
