Everett City Council Promises More Openness

This story from The (Everett) Herald describes the claim by the new Everett City Council to hold more open meetings.

Spokesman-Review Editorial on Financial Institutions Exemptions from Disclosure

The (Spokane) Spokesman-Review has this editorial on some bills in the Legislature to allow information to be withheld on troubled financial institutions.

Olympian Editorial on the Bill to Curb Attorneys' Fee and Penalty Awards in Public Records Act Cases

The Olympian writes this editorial on Senate Bill 6408, which would make attorneys' fee awards to successful requestors optional and would require any penalties obtained to be "donated" to the state.

The editorial quotes Allied Law Group's Greg Overstreet on the effect of SB 6408:

“It will gut the Public Records Act,” said Greg Overstreet, former public records ombudsman and an attorney in private practice. “Love ’em or hate ’em, it takes lawyers to enforce this law and they need to be paid. The law doesn’t enforce itself.”

TNT Editorial on SB 6408

The (Tacoma) News Tribune editorializes against the bill to curb Public Records Act attorneys' fee and penalty awards, providing concrete examples of why SB 6408 would be a bad bill.

HB 3031: An act allowing government agencies to charge fees for large requests

http://apps.leg.wa.gov/documents/billdocs/2009-10/Pdf/Bills/House%20Bills/3031.pdf

From the House Republican press release:

"Under HB 3031, a public agency would be allowed to charge a fee, in advance, if complying with a request for documents would take more than five hours of employee time to produce within a month. The measure would give agencies discretion in deciding when a fee would be appropriate."

What a horrible bill. Government already consumes about 40% of the economy of the United States; do people who collectively pay 40% of everything they work for really need to pay an additional fee to get public records that already belong to them?

Olympian Editorial on Bill to Allow 72-Hour Period to Read the Budget

The Olympian writes this editorial on a bill that makes an astounding amount of sense.