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Most important in the bill is that documents of state and local agencies of government are considered open to the public unless there is a specific and important reason to keep them private, the obverse of the old law.
Under the new bill, sate residents and the press should have a much easier time getting access to documents.
One reason the bill should be effective is the penalties it prescribes for agencies that stall on giving out public information, up to $1,500 for officials who violate the requirements and court costs if the officials are shown to have acted in bad faith.
Also, officials who do not promptly comply with a court order to release records my be fined up to $500 a day until the records are provided.
To make sure information is provided in a timely manner, the bill requires officials to hand over information in five days. Formerly, there was a 10-day window for information to be disbursed.
This law is not perfect. As Barry Kauffman, director of Pennsylvania Common Cause, pointed out on Tuesday, the bill contains limited access to legislative records, lack of criminal penalties for officials and absence of a truly independent open records agency.
Still, as he also said, the glass is more than half full for consumers and all who seek information from state and local agencies.
It took one full year of work to get to this point on open records and the result is overall a good one.
The Senate unanimously voted to approve the new law.
Now it is up to Governor Ed Rendell to sign the measure into law. He has indicated he will.
“The governor has long believed that government should be more transparent so the average citizen has a better understanding of how government works,” said Rendell’s spokesman, Chuck Ardo.
We second that opinion.
