By a vote of 14-4 the NH House judiciary committee voted to advance HB 646, an act making it legal for public bodies to collect a bribe in exchange for public documents.
In the House Calendar we have Democrat David Woodbury (Danger Will Robinson Danger!!) speaking for the majority in favor of passage on a committee with a majority of Republicans. Woodbury claims…”This bill threads the needle between an individual’s right to free and full access to public records and the taxpayer’s right to be free from bearing the substantial costs of unreasonable or abusive document retrievals.”
The Real Republican™ on this issue, Rep Michael Sylvia — speaking for those paltry few on the committee opposed to the bill observed that… “The committee heard from a number of public bodies reporting stories of abusive requests under 91-A; missing from these stories was any substantive example of an abusive request.”
Even if there are such a thing as an abusive request for public documents the solution is not to let the public body set the price or decide who must pay it.
The Jaspercrats on Judiciary disagree. They are on board with taxing access to the paperwork your taxpayer-funded pencil pushers are pushing even when a good deal of that is pushed with electrons. They are aiding in the effort to obscure public information from the people who paid for it and these little editions to the proposed legislation just make matters worse….
(e) A court may reduce or waive the fees charged if it determines that the information requested is in the public interest because it is likely to contribute significantly to public understanding of the operations or activities of the government.
(f) The public body or agency may waive any charges for an individual who demonstrates an inability to pay.
(e) assumes you have the money to go to court and (f) leaves your fate in the hands of the public body who, in their own best interest, will inevitably find you unqualified for the discount when it does not wish to part with the documents. And to that point, how does the public body determine your inability to pay? Do you have to complete a credit application, a financial disclosure form, sit through interviews, and how much does that cost taxpayers whose fiscal interests this bill feigns an interest in?
The Justice committee has exchanged your right to know for a few more pieces of silver in the pockets of towns and cities. They are trying to justify taking from the taxpayers instead of encouraging less expense and easier access.
The solution for taxpayers and public bodies, if you are actually looking for one, is not to make documents less accessible. It is to invest in solutions that will make public documents more accessible at increasingly less cost over time.
The legislature, public bodies, and agencies should confer on ways to make (at the very least) the most commonly requested public documents publicly accessible at no cost, without exception.
The legislature, public bodies, and agencies should find ways to eliminate the middle man, the clerk or functionary whose precious taxpayer funded time might be consumed by the search and dissemination of public information.
The legislature, public bodies, and agencies should make anything and everything that is already scanned or in digital format accessible at the click of a mouse or a tap on a smartphone or tablet.
Instead we have a legislature looking to tax residents with bribery by statute. Bribes whose sum and frequency will be requested and required at the whim of the public body.
