Public Record Request...or Unfunded Mandate?

July 16, 2015

LEGISLATURE PLANS VOTE TO EXPAND PUBLIC RECORDS ACT
Bill Would Impose New Burdens and Unfunded Mandates on Communities
House and Senate Could Vote as Soon as Next Week

Call Your Representatives and Senators Today!!

Facing pressure from newspapers and media publishers from across the state, House and Senate members are preparing to vote on a sweeping expansion of the Public Records Act as early as next week.

The legislation, a redrafted version of H. 2772 (a new number will be assigned in the coming days), would impose new administrative burdens, timelines and significant unfunded mandates on cities and towns. The bill was voted out of the Joint Committee on State Administration and Regulatory Oversight late this afternoon. The bill could be debated by the full House as early as Tuesday, July 21, and immediately proceed to the Senate.

The bill would impose greater burdens on all municipal and state agencies, although the Legislature would continue to exempt itself from all aspects of the Public Records Act.

Click here to download a copy of the redrafted Public Records Act legislation reported out of committee on Thursday afternoon

Please contact your Representatives and Senators as soon as you can to express your opposition to the following aspects of the bill:

• THE BILL IS AN UNFUNDED MANDATE: The bill would impose new unfunded mandates on cities and towns by significantly reducing the amount that communities can charge for complying with a public records request and expanding municipal responsibilities;

• THE BILL SLASHES REIMBURSEMENTS FOR THE COST OF PRODUCING RECORDS: The bill would prevent communities from being reimbursed for the cost of segregating, reviewing, programming, formatting, redacting or determining whether a record is exempt under the law (there are 21 different categories of exemptions in order to protect the public interest or individual privacy rights), unless it would require more than 20 hours to locate, compile and copy AND is over 500 pages in length;

• THE BILL LIMITS WHAT COMMUNITIES CAN BE REIMBURSED FOR: Communities could only be reimbursed for staff time over two hours for copying the records (at the lowest paid rate of administrative staff), 5 cents a page per copy, or the cost of the flash drive or other electronic storage device, unless the request would take more than 20 hours AND 500 pages to fulfill;

• REQUESTS THAT ARE “IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST” AND “CONTRIBUTE SIGNIFICANTLY TO PUBLIC UNDERSTANDING” MUST BE PROVIDED FREE OR AT REDUCED COST: The bill states that cities and towns must charge nothing or a reduced fee if the release of the public information is in the public interest (the media interprets this to mean that newspapers, television and other outlets would not be required to pay at all);

• CITIES AND TOWNS WOULD BE MANDATED TO FULLY COMPLY WITH ALL REQUESTS WITHIN 15 DAYS: Communities would only have 15 days to comply – that is completely fulfill – every public records request, except cities and towns could petition the Supervisor of Public records to ask for an extra 30 days if it will take more than 20 hours of staff time to comply or will result in 500 or more printed pages;

• ELECTRONIC FORMATTING REQUIRED IF REQUESTED (UNLESS NOT AVAILABLE ELECTRONICALLY): All public records must be provided in electronic format if they exist in electronic format (for example, emails, payroll records), if requested, and must be in a common, sortable format (communities cannot be reimbursed for the cost of programming);

• MANDATES THAT UPGRADES TO MUNICIPAL DATABASES MUST BE DESIGNED AROUND THE PUBLIC RECORDS ACT: All future upgrades to community databases and electronic storage systems must be designed to store all public records and comply with all future requests, including being able to sort exempt and non-exempt public records;

• COMMUNITIES MUST APPOINT PUBLIC RECORDS OFFICER(S) WITH NEW DUTIES: All cities and towns would be required to appoint at least one public records officer, with expanded duties to facilitate the fulfillment of public records requests, to publicize all existing databases and categories of public records, and publish the results of all future public records requests;

• FINES CAN BE ASSESSED: Cities and towns would be subject to fines of $20 a day for the first 30 days if they do not comply with a public records request, and $50 dollars a day thereafter, imposed by either a court or the Supervisor of Public Records;

• ATTORNEYS FEES: Cities and towns could be forced to pay attorney fees and court costs to plaintiffs who bring action under the law, if the plaintiffs “substantially” prevail; and

• NO EFFECTIVE LIMIT ON HARASSMENT: The bill allows any party to submit up to 15 separate public records requests in any 30-day period, with no limitations, and communities would be required to comply with all of them subject to the same timeliness and reimbursement restrictions outlined above.