Alert! Major restrictive changes proposed for Utah's records law

Dear Friends of Open Government.

HB477 (Sponsored by John Dougall, R-American Fork) was unveiled
tonight and makes many significant changes to the Utah Government
Records Access and Management Act. It will be heard in committee
tomorrow afternoon at 4:10 p.m. in Room 20 of the House Builidng on
Wednesday. We need people to attend and, if allowed, to testify. We
also need people to start contacting committee members and their
representatives.

Here is a link to the bill:
http://le.utah.gov/~2011/bills/hbillint/hb0477.htm
Attorneys and others are still cataloging all of the proposed
changes, but here are some highlights:
-- The legislature would exempt itself from all provisions of GRAMA
except for the legislative intent and security provisions. Legislative
Management would create its own rules of access.
-- Would change the standard for the for the State Records Committee
to disclose information from a balancing test between the public
interest and other interests to a much higher "preponderance of
evidence" standard.
-- Would remove access to police follow-up reports, even if they
contained information that is classified as part of an "initial
contact report"
-- Would remove text messages, a voice mail message or video chat as
covered documents under the law.
-- Would include the cost of overhead, salaries and experts time in
calculating the cost to copy records.
-- Fee waivers for copies would be based on whether it is in the best
interest of taxpayers resources to do so.
-- The current law states that citizens can inspect a record free of
charge, but the proposed changes says that fees could be applied to
records which are readily available.

And the list goes on.. Talking points and more detailed info to follow...

Please call members of the committee and ask them to oppose this, if
for no other reason that such a major shift in Utah's bedrock
transparency law, needs more than 24 hours review. The original took
two years to develop.

Rep. Michael E. Noel, Chair, Kanab
Rep. Stephen G. Handy, Vice Chair, Layton

Rep. Roger E. Barrus, Centerville
Rep. Fred C. Cox, West Valley,
Rep. John Dougall, American Fork

Rep. Lynn N. Hemingway, Salt Lake City
Rep. Neal B. Hendrickson, West Valley City
Rep. Christopher N. Herrod, Provo

Rep. Ken Ivory, West Jordan
Rep. Ryan D. Wilcox, Ogden
Rep. Brad R. Wilson, Kaysville