Opinion: Citizen watchdogs make most of Right to Know Law
OPINION
By (Harrisburg) Patriot-News Editorial Board
We sometimes get asked what the average man or woman can do to impact government and encourage reform. On cynical days, it’s easy to feel helpless against “the establishment.”
Besides voting (or running for office yourself), one of the best ways to get active in Pennsylvania is to take advantage of the state’s Right to Know Law.
Before 2009, it could be difficult to obtain government records. You had to build a case — sometimes in court — that a document was indeed public.
When the Right to Know Law took effect Jan. 1, that mentality changed 180 degrees.
Now the presumption is that all government records, including e-mails and faxes, are public, and the burden of proof is on the government agency to argue why something should be kept from public view.
It’s easy to file a Right to Know request. The form is a mere page, and you drop it off or e-mail it to a local government or state office.
Common requests are for expense and salary records and real estate and crime information.
Thousands of these requests have gone through smoothly this inaugural year, and not just for journalists.
When a request gets denied, it is often appealed to the nine-member Office of Open Records. They have received more than 1,000 appeals so far this year, with 87 percent coming from non-media sources.
That’s right, average Joes and Janes across the state are playing their part to shine light on what’s going in government.
Not all of these appeals are granted (only about a third have been successful), but that represents hundreds of records that government agencies might not have wanted to share that were ultimately revealed.
This first year of the Right to Know Law has been a huge success. We applaud the office for the vast number of appeals and educational work they have taken on, and, even more so, we say bravo to the many Pennsylvanians who are using the law to get active in the watchdog process.
Here is a look at the number of open records law appeals from midstate counties (as of Dec. 9, 2009):
By (Harrisburg) Patriot-News Editorial Board
We sometimes get asked what the average man or woman can do to impact government and encourage reform. On cynical days, it’s easy to feel helpless against “the establishment.”
Besides voting (or running for office yourself), one of the best ways to get active in Pennsylvania is to take advantage of the state’s Right to Know Law.
Before 2009, it could be difficult to obtain government records. You had to build a case — sometimes in court — that a document was indeed public.
When the Right to Know Law took effect Jan. 1, that mentality changed 180 degrees.
Now the presumption is that all government records, including e-mails and faxes, are public, and the burden of proof is on the government agency to argue why something should be kept from public view.
It’s easy to file a Right to Know request. The form is a mere page, and you drop it off or e-mail it to a local government or state office.
Common requests are for expense and salary records and real estate and crime information.
Thousands of these requests have gone through smoothly this inaugural year, and not just for journalists.
When a request gets denied, it is often appealed to the nine-member Office of Open Records. They have received more than 1,000 appeals so far this year, with 87 percent coming from non-media sources.
That’s right, average Joes and Janes across the state are playing their part to shine light on what’s going in government.
Not all of these appeals are granted (only about a third have been successful), but that represents hundreds of records that government agencies might not have wanted to share that were ultimately revealed.
This first year of the Right to Know Law has been a huge success. We applaud the office for the vast number of appeals and educational work they have taken on, and, even more so, we say bravo to the many Pennsylvanians who are using the law to get active in the watchdog process.
Here is a look at the number of open records law appeals from midstate counties (as of Dec. 9, 2009):
- Cumberland: 30
- Dauphin: 33
- Lebanon: 4
- Perry: 3
- York: 33
