Panel OKs meetings, records bills

Measures would cut response time, add accountability

By Jim Davenport

The Associated Press

COLUMBIA - State and local governments would have less time to respond to public requests for records under legislation heading to the House Judiciary Committee.

A bill trimming the time to respond to seven days instead of the current 15 days cleared a subcommittee Wednesday along with three other bills at the heart of the S.C. Press Association's legislative agenda.

The other bills would:

Require the chairman of a public body to sign a statement certifying the group discussed in an executive session only what the group had told the public they would discuss behind closed doors.

Set copying costs could at no more than what a private sector company would charge.

Clarify that chance or social gatherings of a majority of any public body are public meetings.

While the bills now head to the House Judiciary Committee, they are likely to be marooned and die in the Senate because they probably won't get through the House before the May 1 deadline to be considered by senators.

Regardless of the dim prospects, most representatives of public agencies and local governments said plans to cut the time they have to respond to public records requests would be too burdensome. The bill's original limit of three days "is a huge problem," Jeff Moore, executive director of the S.C. Sheriffs Association, said.

"It can take more than three days just to route the request to the right individual," Moore said.

Jay Bender, a Columbia lawyer and expert on the state's open meetings laws who represents news organizations, said the legislation allows some flexibility.

But a shorter deadline was needed because government bodies routinely run out the 15-day clock before even responding to requests, and even then they don't provide the information requested, Bender said.

Governments are bent on casting citizens wanting information as outsiders, even though courts recognize citizens as the people giving power to governments to carry out their will, Bender said.

Some other states with a 15-day response window require agencies to also provide the documents requested within that time period, Bender said.

The seven-day response period became a middle ground.

Agencies would have seven days to respond and provide documents, but the clock stops until the person requesting the documents pays for them, said Rep. Alan Clemmons, R-Myrtle Beach.