Wow! Those excuses that were given to you sound suspicious. Sounds like they're lazy, don't trust you, or have something to hide in the records. A town that I lived in once shredded an entire era of records that implicated the local government as being under the direction of the KKK during their early 20th century renaissance. A friend I had on the inside managed to smuggle a few documents to me before they were destroyed. I'll continue to look for James Comer and I hope to read more of him, but as of yet, the most popular source name is yours, you've been busy. The one thought I had was that perhaps a lobbying group(research institution, historical society,etc.) could get the information for you on your behalf easier than you could as an individual.

Good Luck, Allen L. Lee