Out of left field comes a proposal from the Illinois State’s Attorneys Association, claiming that your local crime fighters are ready, willing and eager to take on the job of policing requests for public records.
From somewhere in outer space comes a letter from the Illinois Municipal League, arguing that if local governments are required to provide public documents in a timely manner, they’ll have to lay off cops and firefighters to pay for clerks to make the copies and lawyers to fight nuisance requests.
Both groups are lobbying Gov. Pat Quinn to amend — a better word is “gut” — a rewrite of the state’s Freedom of Information Act passed by the General Assembly in the spring.
With the abuses of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich fresh in everyone’s mind, lawmakers promised a series of ethical reforms meant to restore integrity and transparency to state government. One target was the state’s toothless FOIA, routinely ignored by public officials who don’t want taxpayers looking over their shoulders.
Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan’s staff drafted a bill with input from news media, law enforcement, local governments and taxpayer watchdog groups, as well as Quinn’s blue-ribbon Illinois Reform Commission. The debate was lively, given the competing agendas, but the idea that prosecutors would handle FOIA complaints didn’t come up until the bill was sitting on Quinn’s desk.
If it had, we would have expected the state’s attorneys to howl about their already oppressive caseload, the way they do every year at budget time. They barely have the resources to pursue murderers and rapists, remember? We can’t imagine prosecutors going after, say, the county board for ignoring a citizen’s request for a public record. This is not a job for the state’s attorney’s office.
The state’s attorneys association, in a letter to Quinn, says the bill would threaten the use of confidential informants and undercover officers and violate the privacy of crime victims.
The letter offers nothing to support those claims. That’s because they’re baloney.
As for the Municipal League’s complaints, we’re reminded of the Better Government Association’s 2006 report about the experiences of a taxpayer who made a simple records request of 408 local governments in Illinois. Fewer than a third complied; 39 percent didn’t even respond. Public officials delayed, resisted and tried to levy illegal charges for records. “Most striking was the level of hostility” directed at the citizen making perfectly legal requests, the report said.
If you think that’s an exaggeration, take a look at the Municipal League’s letter to Quinn. It warns that crafty citizens will exploit the first-50-pages-are-free rule by breaking down 500-page requests into 10 50-page requests and adds that “FOIA is often used as a political tool not to gather information but to harass and harangue public officials.”
The bill, it says, will create “a legal thicket” that will overwhelm municipal clerks. It will result in “staggering amounts of documents being shipped back and forth.”
Among the most burdensome provisions is one that requires public bodies to name a point person to handle records requests, the letter says. “There are questions as to whether the FOIA officer is a de jure or de facto officer, which may trigger issues with appointment procedures and with restrictions on holding multiple offices. There are also potential collective bargaining issues at play.”
It’s a miracle the trash gets picked up, isn’t it? Clearly, local governments in Illinois need a major attitude adjustment about transparency, and we think Quinn is just the guy to make that happen.
Nobody loves this bill. We’d like it to be even stronger than it is. But it does a decent job of balancing the public’s right to know against government’s legitimate need to keep a very few things secret. It passed the House and Senate by a combined vote of 174-1.
Quinn should sign it. Today.
