Tallahassee Democrat

Wakulla’s fees to view records irk residents

By Julian Pecquet • Democrat Staff Writer • March 17, 2008

CRAWFORDVILLE — Wakulla County has a new public-records policy that has eliminated some obstacles residents reported in the past, but advocates say there’s still room for improvement.

Gone is the controversial form that requesters had to fill out with their name, which was in violation of the Florida Sunshine Law’s guarantee of anonymity. Gone also is the automatic review of all records requests by the county attorney.

But obstacles to openness remain, open government advocates say. These include difficulties getting commissioners’ e-mails and a new rule that calls for people to pay for an employee’s time spent supervising them if they spend more than a half-hour looking at a record.

“In this country, no one should have to pay to look at a government record,” said Dana Peck, a former Capitol reporter who teaches journalism at Tallahassee Community College.

Wakulla County Administrator Ben Pingree, who is the official records custodian, said people have a choice of requesting copies and paying 15 cents per page or coming to the office to view originals. He said the fee makes sense because staff need to ensure that original documents aren’t stolen, damaged or destroyed. The fee equals the hourly rate of the lowest-paid employee who’s able and available to do the supervision.

Adria Harper, the director of the First Amendment Foundation in Tallahassee, said that policy sounded “unreasonable.”

“The custodian is supposed to be there,” she said. “Sure, they’ll have to be a little more careful to make sure you’re not ripping (documents) up, but (the proposed fee) sounds unreasonable.”

Donna Raffensperger, who handles public-records requests for the city of Tallahassee, said the city charges people if it takes time to get records together, but doesn’t charge for viewing records.

“Basically, we’re sitting by the person by our choice,” she said. “You’re not requesting us to be there.”

Access to Wakulla county commissioners’ e-mails has also been an issue because the individual commissioners are the ones who grant access.

After resident Hugh Taylor requested Commission Chairman Ed Brimner’s last 100 e-mails related to county business last year, Brimner sent an e-mail to several people calling it a “fishing expedition to attempt to find something that can be used against me.” He then told Taylor it would cost him $120 for the four hours he estimated it would take for him to sort out which were personal and which weren’t.

Brimner eventually answered Taylor’s request and asked Pingree to charge Taylor, which he didn’t do.

Harper recommended that governments “get a policy on maintaining e-mail records, and make sure it’s clear.”

That’s what the city of Tallahassee has in place, Raffensperger said. She said staffers with the city’s information-systems service gather e-mails when they’re requested, then give the person whose records were requested — staff member or commissioner — a chance to remove those that are personal. There is no cost to the requester.

Wakulla County Commissioner Howard Kessler said Wakulla County would be better served if it had a similar policy.

The new records policy, “hopefully, will provide a way in which citizens will have confidence in the information they’re receiving,” he said. “I think it’s still a little difficult. . . you’re reliant on an individual; I’d like to see more and more reliance on the custodian of the records.”

Reproduced courtesy of the Tallahassee Democrat.
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