TRENTON, N.J. (KYW Newsradio) — New Jersey’s Senate Budget Committee has advanced a bill that would make big changes to public records access.
The committee heard hours of testimony on Thursday, both for and against the bill, which would reform the state’s existing Open Public Records Act. Critics of the bill say it would make it harder for people to access records.
Journalists, community activists and public policy experts lined up to urge lawmakers to reject the bill. Peter Chen, with New Jersey Policy Perspective, says the changes would place the burden of proof for denials in the hands of citizens. Chen says the new bill would require people to have uncommon knowledge of government personnel to get a request approved.
“Who am I supposed to be requesting emails about?” he asked. “I might not know, right?”
Deptford Mayor Paul Medany was among those in favor of the bill. He says his town and many others are being inundated with commercial requests for records. He says so far this year there have been 200 requests in Deptford.
“Only three of them were from residents of Deptford Township. The rest were discovery from lawyers, OPRA companies, a Florida attorney who is mad at a zoning decision, private companies doing research, developers,” Medany said. “We have to fix this. It has to change. Thank you for listening to me.”
Sharon Steinhorn, co-president of the Monmouth County League of Women Voters, says the new bill would gut important transparency provisions people rely on and make it harder for people to access public records. Steinhorn adds it would even allow the government to sue someone for filing too many requests.
“The changes to harassment still enable the public to be sued for vague and unclear reasons,” she said, “and it still remains difficult for the public to get access to the records they need.”
The bill cleared committee by a 9-3 vote, though some members said they could change their mind by the time it’s up for a full vote if no changes are made.