passopenrecords.org

There is so much activity across the state right focused on open records reform that it is almost impossible to keep up with it.

What is more important is to make sure we keep it up.

Because while a lot of good things are happening – most recently and importantly Sen. Dominic Pileggi’s announcement that he will soon offer an amendment to his Senate Bill 1 that will “flip the presumption” and make government records public unless they are specifically exempted by law. This is a critical change.

But there are people out there who do not want to see change and are working to get this train off the tracks and into the roundhouse. And we can assume they are taking their case behind closed doors.

Some reflections on Monday’s Senate hearing:

Emily J. Leader, the deputy chief counsel for the Pa. School Boards Association, said the law we now have has served the public’s right to know just fine, and “we strongly support preserving the current structure.” She insisted that Senate Bill 765, which is sponsored by Jim Ferlo (D-38) and incorporates PNA’s model language, would a require “a whole new level of interpretation . . . but end up with the same records that are available today.”

While she said she hadn’t finished reading the bill yet, she told the panel that it would lead to a lot of litigation. Reiterating that she was “not sure the current condition needs to be improved,” she said that the claim that Pennsylvania has the most restrictive open records law in the country is “simply not true.” She had no evidence, she said, but “that’s my impression.”

The testimony of Douglas Hill, executive director of the County Commissioners Association – who was also representing the townships, municipal authorities, cities and boroughs – was low-key, reasonable and largely explanatory. Essentially, Hill described what local governments do and how the 2002 changes have affected their open-records efforts. He did say that all the associations support “clear open records statutes” and that the changes of five years ago had brought more – and welcome – clarity.

Hill said that if the presumption does change, his organizations will need a full and accurate list of what is or is not covered. He also spoke about the need to provide training for local employees.

It was hard to know whether Graham Spanier, the president of Penn State, opposed open records reform of any kind or just wanted to make sure that his organization was exempted from any and all provisions of the legislation. Right now, Sen. Pileggi’s bill includes the four state-related universities – Penn State, Temple, Lincoln and the University of Pittsburgh. While Temple and Pitt have registered strong opposition to this provision as well, Dr. Spanier seemed particularly upset about a bill he said would have a “profound negative impact” on Pennsylvania’s state-related research universities.

He seemed mad that Penn State was included in the proposed bill; mad that the four state-related institutions were singled out, while such competitors as the University of Pennsylvania and other state-aided institutions were exempted; mad at newspapers, many of whom, he suggested, get a bigger portion of their budgets from the state than Penn State does; mad at the “prurient interests of newspaper editors who are looking for a headline about how much Coach Paterno makes;” and he was probably none too pleased when Sen. Mike Folmer (R-48) suggested, tongue in cheek perhaps, that if the university didn’t take any state money, it would not have to answer for anything.

It was hard at times to tell he was speaking on behalf of an institution of higher education, rather than a privately held corporation that happened to be located in a compound in State College, as he described a world of cut-throat competition, spin-off companies, secretive contracts and “lucrative partnerships with Nike, Highmark, Pepsi, Barnes and Noble . . .” (ah, books!).

There are important issues here, particularly those that have to do with the protection of intellectual property as well as privacy concerns. But, as someone said later of his prophecies of imminent calamity, “the sky is not falling.”

Earlier, Ellen Kramer Adler of the Pa. Coalition Against Violence had addressed far more effectively the critical issue of protecting privacy – in this case the privacy of the all-too vulnerable victims of violence, stalking and sexual assault. Her remarks crystallized, at least for me, the crucial distinction between privacy and secrecy.

Asked by Sen. Jeffrey Piccola (R-15) how her testimony conflicted with that just given by the newspaper representatives, she replied, “I’m not sure that it does, Senator.”