Rendell to get bill on open records
The measure widens access to government documents.
It's the first of reforms long promised by the legislature
Feb. 13, 2008
By Angela Couloumbis
Inquirer Harrisburg bureau
HARRISBURG — Enacting the first major piece of its government reform agenda after months of debate, the state legislature yesterday approved a bill to greatly expand public access to a wide array of government records.
The measure, passed unanimously yesterday by the Senate, is now being sent to Gov. Rendell, whose spokesman said the governor intends to sign it within days.
"What this proves is that when the House and Senate, Democrats and Republicans, get together and get their heads together - instead of banging their heads against each other - anything is possible," Sen. Michael A. O'Pake (D., Berks) said yesterday.
Not since the lobbyist disclosure law in 2006 has the legislature passed a major government reform bill, even though "government reform" has been the mantra in the Capitol since 2005.
That was when lawmakers granted themselves hefty pay raises in the dead of the night that they were later forced to rescind after a public outcry.
O'Pake and others said they hoped the open-records bill would trigger action on a number of other measures intended to increase government accountability and openness. Those include reducing the size of the legislature, creating a constitutional convention to allow lawmakers to revise the state constitution, and limiting legislative perks.
To date, those bills have either stalled in committee or are considered effectively dead.
The open-records bill approved yesterday would declare that all state and local government records will be public unless specifically exempted.
It would also shift the burden onto a government agency to prove why a record should be shielded from public view.
Previously, the state's right-to-know law effectively made all records closed unless specified otherwise. It has long been considered one of the most restrictive laws in the nation.
The new legislation would also create an Office of Open Records with its own independent director and staff, to be housed in the Department of Community and Economic Development.
And for the first time, the legislature would be subject to the open-records law. The House and Senate have historically been excluded from open-records laws, making it difficult to access even basic information.
The law will take effect on Jan. 1 to allow agencies and the legislature time to implement the new rules and hire additional staff. The law is retroactive and covers records already collected by government agencies.
Open-records advocates, however, believe the bill still has flaws, thought they call it a major improvement over the current act.
One criticism is that the legislature would not fall under the jurisdiction of the Office of Open Records. Instead, the House and Senate would be allowed to decide whether they are in compliance with the law.
Barry Kauffman, executive director of Common Cause PA, also pointed out that the Office of Open Records would not be truly independent since it would be attached to a state department under Rendell's jurisdiction. Kauffman believes the office must be part of an independent agency, such as the state Ethics Commission.
Kauffman also said the bill could open the door to allowing municipalities to slap people with nuisance fees - such as a charge for a staff member's time - when they try to seek public records.
And the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association has raised concerns about an exemption in the bill that would cover records relating to minors. The association believes the exemption is so broad that it could prevent even the release of names of students on the honor roll.
Senators yesterday downplayed those concerns, saying that the bill would give each agency - including police agencies - the ability to release records that would otherwise be private as long as those records are not protected by federal or state law, or by a privilege such as doctor-patient or attorney-client.
"The open-records law . . . only controls what an agency is mandated to release," said Sen. Dominic Pileggi (R., Delaware), the sponsor of the bill. "There are many reasons why an agency would want to go beyond what the law mandates."
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