Characterizing a significant number of those who use the California Public Records Act as having “frivolous” or “malicious” intent in seeking access to documents and other materials pertaining to governmental operations, a Southern California Assemblywoman has drafted a bill that would delay responses to requests for information, data, reports or records contained in state, county, city or agency files and subject those deemed by officials to have abused the process to lawsuits brought by the government.
In March, Assemblywoman Blanca Pacheco introduced Assembly Bill 1821, which she said will address what she, other members of the state legislature and hundreds of city and county officials up and down the state describe as an intolerable and growing burden on local agencies caused by mounting numbers of and increasingly complex public records requests.
Under Pacheco’s proposed law, the time by which counties, cities and agencies would have additional time to respond to California Public Records Act requests would be increased from 10 calendar days to 24 and would allow agencies to charge hourly fees ranging from $22 to $66 for staff time spent searching for and reviewing records if those materials have any conceivable commercial use.

AB 1821 would further authorize a state or local agency to sue a member of the public for filing a public records request by alleging that in seeking the documents or information in question, the requester evinced “malicious intent.”
Pacheco has tacitly acknowledged that she authored and carried Assembly Bill 1821 at the behest of the League of California Cities and the California State Association of Counties. In forums where she has not needed to respond to opponents of the bill, she has decried so-called “data-scaping” efforts by members of the public who out of antagonism toward the government are seeking to overwhelm governmental agencies with burdensome and voluminous requests that cannot be responded to under the existing timelines by existing government resources and staff.
Despite the assertions by Pacheco and others that the California Public Records Act has been widely abused and is in need for reform, a spectrum of those who make use of the law which was passed by the California State Legislature and signed by then-governor Ronald Reagan in 1968 requiring inspection or disclosure of governmental records to the public upon request, unless exempted by law, maintain that it has become an indispensable element of the California Government Code which holds officials accountable and prevents excessive secrecy in the application of governmental authority.
The First Amendment Coalition, a nonpartisan, nonprofit public interest organization dedicated to advancing free speech, a free press, and the public’s right to know founded in 1988 maintains that Assembly Bill 1821 is contrary to the concept of government transparency, accountability and democracy.
David Snyder, executive director of the First Amendment Coalition characterized Assembly Bill 182 as the latest effort by the government “to get around accountability.”
Snyder said, “I cannot speak for the proponents of this bill, but what they are saying, generally, is that requests made pursuant to the California Public Records Act are over-burdensome and that government agencies and staff members need more time and money to comply with the requests. They say that there are an excessive number of abusive requests, ones that are made for the purposes of harassment of public employees and government staff and that there are too many requests where those filing for records are not interested in receiving the results but rather in gumming up the works of government. Assemblywoman Pacheco and both the California League of Cities and the California Association of Counties are making the argument that California Public Records Act is much too burdensome and that this bill fixes the problem Our position is there are already solutions in the law for those problems. Under the California Public Records Act, government agencies need not respond to requests that are truly frivolous or burdensome. This law is not needed to achieve the objective its sponsors have set for it.”
Those who are overburdened in the efforts to uncover information locked and hidden in government files are the citizens, whose major tool consists of the California Public Records Act, Snyder said, rather than the public officials who must abide by the law aimed at promoting open transparent government.
It appeared, Snyder said, that Pacheco had fallen under the influence of California League of Cities and the California Association of Counties, organizations which are which answerable and sensitive to the concerns of government employees and elected officials than common citizens subject to the authority of government officials.
“Everyday, for the public that is requesting information from the government, too many citizens face a process that is too burdensome and much too expensive,” Snyder said. “The law recognizes there is a power disparity between the government and the public. Members of the public making requests of the government for information doesn’t have the information. The government does. The public doesn’t know what the agency possesses, how the records are stored or where they are stored. The government does. The California Public Records Act is a means to even that power imbalance. What Assembly Bill 1821 would do is prevent that balancing of power from taking place. It would, on all fronts, make trying to get information from the government more expensive. It would make it so getting that information will take longer. Worse, it would allow the government to take a requestor into court if someone in the government deemed the submission of the request to have been made with malicious intent, a term that was not defined. That provision is ripe for abuse. Most government officials who are involved in responding to public information requests act in good faith. Nevertheless, for those who are not acting in good faith, Assembly Bill 1821 would give them the opportunity to bring anyone who is using the California Public Records Act into court if they perceive them as a political enemy. The most damning aspect of this proposed law is folks who are contemplating using the California Public Records Act would have to consider the price and consequences of submitting a records request. If you are looking for information about what the government is doing, using the California Public Records Act is probably the best and most logical way to do that, but if that means the government can haul you in front of a judge just for asking some questions, most people are going to think twice before getting involved in monitoring how government works.”
Snyder said Assembly Bill 1821’s sponsors “say it would be limited to truly problematic requestors and that some members of the public are behaving like vandals in submitting frivolous requests to agencies they are angry with.”
The vast majority of those filing public record requests are doing so earnest and with a benign purpose in mind, Snyder said. In those relatively rare cases in which a malcontent is abusing the act to bedevil bureaucrats, government officials can simply ignore the requests and bypass the burden they might otherwise represent.
“The solutions for those sorts of abuses are already in the current law,” Snyder said. “If they see this as a problem, then they should come up with common sense solutions and not make life easier for government agencies that are hiding important information while making it more difficult for those requesting If the request [for information or documents] is overly board, public officials have an obligation to assist the requestor to narrow the request. That is where the efforts [of the government] should be made, in training staff members how to assist the public in obtaining the information that is being sought.”
To the alarm of government transparency advocates, soon after the Assembly Bill 1821 was introduced and given its first committee hearing, Pacheco, at the behest of other legislators and the California League of Cities and the California Association of Counties, acquiesced to the addition of what open government advocates consider even more ominous provisions, such as subjecting those who use the California Public Records Act to lawsuits and costly judgments.
Pacheco and her chief of staff, Nikki Johnson, apparently did not foresee the virulent reaction Assembly Bill 1821 provoked over a widespread sector of the public, both within her district and outside of it, involving heavily influential entities across the political spectrum.
One suggestion was that in addition to the California League of Cities and the California Association of Counties, Pacheco had carried the legislation on behalf of her own Democratic Party, members of which are in ascendancy generally throughout California, including dominating local government. The bill would be of benefit to those officeholders, most of whom are Democrats, Assemblyman Carl DeMaio, a Republican from San Diego pointed out in his opposition to AB 1821.
Others who traditionally identify as being with or in league with the Democratic Party, extending to government reform advocates, found Assembly Bill 1821 equally offensive.
In response to very pointed questions about how Assembly Bill 1821 gutted key elements of the California Public Records Act and he spirit of transparency behind it, Pacheco, Johnson and Pacheco’s pubic spokeswoman, Alina Evans, headed for the tall grass.
The Sentinel sought from Pacheco, Johnson and Evans whether Pacheco could outline the flaws that exist in the California Public Records Act as it now exists, if the assemblywoman still believes the act’s provisions represent too much of a burden on public officials and public agencies and if she thinks members of the public are too invasive in their requests for information from the government.
The Sentinel asked Pacheco through Johnson and Evans, to illustrate how Assembly Bill 1821 improves the current circumstance?
The Sentinel asked Pacheco, through both Johnson and Evans in separate emails, why Assemblywoman Pacheco believes the California Public Records Act is in need of reform. The Sentinel, through the emails to Johnson and Evans, asked what cogent response Assemblywoman Pacheco would provide to those who say that Assembly Bill 1821 is an attempt to place government operations under an inappropriate umbrella of secrecy, one that restricts sunshine from illuminating government’s operations. The Sentinel directly sought from Assemblywoman Pacheco a cogent and definitive justification, defense and rationale for Assembly Bill 1821 and asked her to controvert those who maintain the proposed law will be damaging to the concept of openness, transparency and rationality in the operation of government.
Neither Pacheco, Johnson nor Evans responded.