Testimony Before The Senate State Government Committee Regarding Senate Bill 1333 Access to Public Information by Rebecca Daugherty Freedom of Information Service Center Director Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press October 4, 2000   Mr. Chairman, members of the State Government Committee, thank you for this opportunity to speak about the state of open records access in Pennsylvania, and thank you for considering these important changes to the law in your state. For nearly 14 years I have been the Freedom of Information Service Center Director for the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, a voluntary, unincorporated association established in 1970 by news editors and reporters to defend the First Amendment and freedom of information rights of the print and broadcast media and to help reporters who encounter legal difficulty in gathering and covering the news. We run a hotline for reporters and others and the majority of the calls we receive concern Freedom of Information issues. The Reporters Committee, which is now located in Arlington, Va., also publishes numerous publications, including a quarterly journal The News Media & The Law and a bi-weekly newsletter News Media Update. We are presently working on our fourth edition of Tapping Officials’ Secrets, a 50-State and District of Columbia compendium of open records and open meetings laws; and have written other open records guides including Access to Electronic Records in the States and Police Records, A Guide to Effective Access in the 50 States and D.C. Most of these publications are available on our Web site www.rcfp.org as well as in hard copy. We have close ties to your state. Two of our past three legal fellowships in Freedom of Information are Dickinson College Law School graduates. We have also had many journalism interns from your state, including Troy Hough from Penn State who is with us now. The State of Open Records Law in Pennsylvania We have heard from reporters who were unable to find murder records; who were unable to learn the number of students expelled from a school district; who could not gain access to records of administration at a public hospital; who could not gain information about a disciplined doctor from the state’s licensing agency; who could not access records on the New Jersey-Pennsylvania Port Authority, apparently because neither state law applied; who could not see mug shots at a police station. In one instance, we were told that a school system denied records on a teacher who left the state abruptly only to be charged with child molestation in the next state where he taught. We have rarely been able to help, other than to commiserate The question I have answered most frequently from Pennsylvanians is “How do you think Pennsylvania’s open records law compare to that of other states?” And the answer I give is either that it is the worst, or close to it -- New Jersey also has an abysmal law. We are also often asked to identify the best state laws and I cannot, although I am on an advisory committee to a project of the Brechner Center in Florida which has taken on that ranking as a project. The worst is an easier question. Only the law in your state and, in effect, the law in New Jersey, identify which of the public’s records will be open as opposed to only exempting from disclosure those that will be closed. I am sure you have heard many horror stories about the failure of your law to keep the citizens of Pennsylvania informed about the workings of their government. As an outsider, it would be impolite for me to criticize the state of your law too stridently, but I do think that others of us are surprised at how little openness you have in your state. We learned in grade school of the many contributions Pennsylvania made to the democracy we enjoy today. It seems to me to be a very real shame that Pennsylvanians cannot today be fully informed participants in the democracy of their state. We hope that situation will soon be over. What the New Law Offers This is an excellent bill. It is carefully crafted to address public needs for information. The committee which studied it was thorough in identifying the shortcomings of the Pennsylvania law and what needs to be done to address those shortcomings. It is not ambiguous. I particularly like the language on law enforcement records which clearly delineates what will be open and what will be exempt. The public has a very strong interest in ensuring that law enforcement agencies are effective and this exemption serves that interest. The bill also ensures its own enforcement in this area by making clear to the individuals who must provide records what they must do to comply with the law. It provides some oversight of the process, assuring that non-exempt material will be provided promptly and ensuring that government employees charged with carrying out the provisions of the law will do so or face appeals and/or sanctions. This is very important to keep citizens from growing cynical at the existence of a law that cannot be enforced. I will be happy to entertain questions or provide any resources that we have at the Reporters Committee that this committee may find useful.
Suite 900 1815 N. Fort Myer Drive Arlington, VA 22209-1817 (703) 807-2100 rcfp@rcfp.org http://www.rcfp.org Lucy A. Dalglish Executive Director STEERING COMMITTEE • GAIL APPLESON   Reuters America Inc. • SCOTT APPLEWHITE   The Associated Press • ROSEMARY ARMAO   Sarasota Herald-Tribune • CHARLES R. BABCOCK   The Washington Post • CHIP BOK   Akron Beacon Journal • TOM BROKAW   NBC News • EARL CALDWELL   Syndicated columnist • WALTER CRONKITE   CBS News • GARY DECKELNICK   Asbury Park Press • CARROLL DOHERTY   Pew Research Center • RICHARD S. DUNHAM   Business Week • SARA FRITZ   St. Petersburg Times • FRED GRAHAM   Court TV • JOHN C. HENRY   Houston Chronicle • NAT HENTOFF   The Village Voice • KAREN GRAY HOUSTON   Fox News • ALBERT HUNT   The Wall Street Journal • PETER JENNINGS   ABC News • STEPHEN LABATON   The New York Times • JAMES MANN   Los Angeles Times • TONY MAURO   American Lawyer Media • WILSON F. MINOR   Factual Reporting Service • JEFF NESMITH   Cox Newspapers • SANDRA PEDDIE   Newsday • DAN RATHER   CBS News • DAVID ROSENBAUM   The New York Times • CRISTINE RUSSELL   The Washington Post • CAROLE SIMPSON   ABC News Affiliations appear only for purposes of identification.