Friday, April 12, 2019 | 2 a.m.
A bill to beef up Nevada’s open records statutes has undergone some key changes since it was introduced early this month.
Now, facing a critical committee hearing today, it should be allowed to keep moving through the legislative process.
We weren’t thrilled with the bill in its original form, and we said so in no uncertain terms. Among its fundamental problems, it established steep financial penalties for government organizations and even individual public servants for violations, and it created the possibility of government offices essentially being paralyzed by trolls filing nuisance requests for records.
But after those and other concerns were aired during an earlier hearing, the bill’s proponents went back to the drawing board and came out with several amendments.
Among them, the penalties have been drastically dialed down, from up to $250,000 to a maximum of $2,500, bringing them in line with penalties in the state’s open meetings statutes. That’s still a lot of money for an individual to pay, but there’s also an amendment that would absolve public officials from any penalties if it’s determined that they acted in good faith when denying a records request.
Further, there’s a provision to allow officials to petition district courts for relief from “vexatious and clearly frivolous” requests. Think requests for thousands or millions of documents, for instance.
The bill in its current form may not be perfect, but it’s a step in the right direction. Lawmakers should approve it today and keep negotiating as the bill advances.
As we stated before, the proposal is well-intentioned and is designed to serve a critical need.
Currently, Nevada’s open records statutes are vague and weak, which has hurt government transparency and the public’s right to know what their public officials are doing.
As a result, there’s vast discrepancy in how state government operations handle requests. Some charge for documents, and some don’t. Some charge only for the hard costs of reproducing paper records — photocopying expenses, staff time for retrieving documents from files, postage, etc. — while others have taken advantage of a loophole to also charge for services like legal reviews.
This is not good government. The state needs a clearly defined open records statute.
The original bill added definition but was crafted in a way that made it more about punishing government officials than promoting transparency. With the enormous penalties and without the “good faith” protection, it left government offices almost powerless to reject ill-intended requests.
An entirely feasible outcome was that anti-government extremists could regularly file requests for huge numbers of records, forcing offices to hire staff or take staff members away from important work in order to fulfill the requests.
Again, the revised version may not be perfect. But the proponents — a coalition of news organizations, advocacy groups and individuals — have acted in good faith by altering the original version. Lawmakers, in turn, should keep massaging the bill.
When it was introduced, the legislation drew a wall of opposition from government officials. Some of that was legitimate.
But legislative leaders need to understand that access to public documents is a critical need for our democracy. Not only does it help the media to fulfill their role as watchdogs, it gives the public a powerful tool in helping hold government officials accountable.
If the bill fails to advance today, it will die. That wouldn’t be right. Lawmakers should vote it out of committee.
Editor’s note: The Las Vegas Sun opted not to join the coalition supporting the bill. However, the Sun is a member of the Nevada Press Association, which is part of the coalition.
