Daily News: “The openness of Open Records just became a concern”

As It’s Our Money from the Daily News shares: For half a century, Pennsylvania had an embarrassingly bad open-records policy. The 1957 law held that all government records were closed to the public unless a citizen met the legal burden of explaining why they should be available. A 2009 law, championed by Senate Majority Leader […]

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Aug 10, 2011 12:30pm

As It’s Our Money from the Daily News shares:

For half a century, Pennsylvania had an embarrassingly bad open-records policy. The 1957 law held that all government records were closed to the public unless a citizen met the legal burden of explaining why they should be available. A 2009 law, championed by Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi, turned this idiocy upside down: It made government records open unless the government could show they were covered by one of a number of exceptions. And it created an Office of Open Records (OOR) for citizens to appeal to when agencies denied their requests. That office has thus far been a staunch advocate for open government, taking a generous view of what records should be made public and helping citizens get them. But a new court decision, reported in the Inquirer on Monday, threatens to shut the door on open records, at least part way. It forces citizens to jump through hoops in order to get the help of the OOR…

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