The final version of House Bill 1002 targets people or companies that file sweeping public records requests for commercial purposes. (Getty Images)
Come August, the public will pay more to get public records under the right-to-know law, though a bill signed Friday includes several exemptions.
Individuals who can’t afford to pay and the media would not be charged. Nor would people who request information that, if disclosed, would help the public better understand governmental actions and decisions.
The original version of the bill did not include those exemptions and would have included higher fees of $25 an hour to gather and prepare documents.
Prime sponsor Rep. Katelyn Kuttab, a Windham Republican, worked with the bill’s critics, namely the New Hampshire Press Association, ACLU of New Hampshire, and Right to Know NH, to reach a compromise.
The final version of House Bill 1002, signed Friday by Gov. Chris Sununu, targets people or companies that file sweeping public records requests for commercial purposes, which can be so broad they require hours or weeks to fulfill. For example, a solar company obtained dozens of building permits from communities through right-to-know requests to identify potential customers.
The new law drops the hourly fee and allows municipalities and agencies to charge for only electronic communications, such as emails and text and chat messages. And there could be no charge for the first 250 communications.
It takes effect 60 days from Friday. Governmental agencies and municipal offices can still charge for the cost of copying records, something allowed under current law.
A second right-to-know bill, House Bill 1069, failed to make it out of the Legislature. It would have replaced the word “citizen” in the right-to-know law with “person.”
The bill was intended to stop communities from denying public records requests filed by nonresidents or people who lived in other states, or making it harder for them to get documents. For example, the city of Rochester stopped sending the editor of the Rochester Voice public records via email and made him come retrieve the documents in person because he lives just over the New Hampshire border, in Maine.
The House and Senate could not reconcile changes each made to the bill.
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