passopenrecords.org

This chain of events was brought to my attention through the Washington Observer-Reporter website as well as the blog of one of their reporters, Scott Beveridge. Below is a recap and overview of the O-R and Beveridge’s struggle, and most of it in his own words. I’d recommend clicking on the story links to the original text, since they give the full story much better than I ever could. Here’s my summary:

The Washington Observer-Reporter ’s Scott Beveridge has been trying to get a copy of a feasibility study on bringing water to a new waste coal power plant being developed in Washington County, Pa.

According to the Observer-Reporter, at least one public citizen “was allowed to look at the nearly 40-page report once but felt a bit intimidated while a county official and another man stood over her at the Washington County Conservation District office when she went there to read the document. She ended up receiving copies of just eight pages of the report that was funded in March with a $157,000 grant from Gov. Ed Rendell.”

The Washington County Conservation District initially refused the request because Beveridge “wouldn’t understand it.” Eventually, they called back on 9/21 and said that he’d “rattled enough chains” and that they’d release it.

That’s not the end of the story. On Tuesday, Beveridge posted that the paper was hit with an estimate of $219.23 for producing the report. The paper is fighting this cost as unreasonable.

As you might remember from Jim Parsons’ stories at the FOIJ/SPJ forum in Pittsburgh , this practice is becoming increasingly common.

On Wednesday, the O-R penned an editorial on the situation, concluding, “This is an old story: Make access to public records as expensive and difficult as possible. Maybe the public will go away and leave the public agencies in peace.”

Thanks to journalists like Scott Beveridge and papers like the Observer-Reporter, who keep “rattling the chains” for the public. Maybe someday citizens and journalists won’t have to jump through hoops to get public information.

Also, one of the other FOIA bloggers posed an interesting question, and is asking for thoughts and input:

The situation: Person A filed an open records request with a state agency in his state. The state agency responded that they would fulfill the request but that it would cost about $650. The great majority of this fee was the fee to review and redact the requested documents. Shortly thereafter, Person A learned that Person B had requested the exact same documents about a week before he did. Person B was given the same fee–about $650 for review and redaction. Person B had in fact already paid the fee, and the review and redaction of the requested documents had occurred by the time that Person A requested them. This looks like double-billing. Is it? How would you handle this if you were Person A? Or Person B, for that matter?