A 103-page bill has been introduced in the Legislature to amend the law that tells Utahns what they have a right to know about their government, but it does not contain four controversial provisions sought by government attorneys.
The proposed provision that concerned representatives of media and public-interest organizations the most would have kept secret documents used by government officials in the decisionmaking process.The bill introduced in the House Tuesday by Rep. Martin Stephens, R-Farr West, contains some 200 changes to the Government Records Access and Management Act that both public and government interests did agree on.
The two sides began meeting late last year to sort out their differences over sweeping changes proposed by the attorney general's office on behalf of several state and local government attorneys.
The areas of agreement on changes needed to the act passed by the 1991 Legislature include criminal penalties for government employees who wrongfully release or withhold information.
Other issues, such as whether to charge fees for researching government records or whether government agencies could delay responding to requests for information, have been set aside.
Stephens and Sen. David Steele, R-West Point, rejected the four remaining provisions that the government attorneys wanted to add to the act scheduled to take effect later this year.
Stephens told the government attorneys at a meeting Monday called to hear any final suggestions that the so-called deliberative process exemption was too broad.
"Every single document in government falls under that," Stephens said. The provision cited "memoranda, recommendations, correspondence and other records. . . ."
The proposed provision would protect those materials when "the public interest in encouraging frank communication between officials and employees of government entities outweighs the public interest in disclosure."
John Clark, counsel to Attorney General Paul Van Dam, said there are times when government officials should not be "subject to the harsh glare of public scrutiny."
Kate Lahey, a University of Utah law professor and attorney for the Society of Professional Journalists, said she objected to the provision because it placed too much of a burden on the public "to challenge this secrecy."
Reporters told the legislators that such information needed to be made available before decisions are made so that the public could have a say in the process.
Besides deliberative process, other provisions unsuccessfully pitched by the government attorneys included giving a court the ability to restrict access to public records.
Another provision would have required government entities to keep track of information sought by individuals or groups suing those same government entities.
The government attorneys also wanted to spell out that while government entities could respond to a verbal request, only those made in writing are subject to the provisions in the act designed to protect access.