Iowa Must Review its Open Meetings and Open Records Laws
In her State of the Judiciary speech given to the Iowa General Assembly on January 10, Chief Justice Marcia Ternus laid out an ambitious plan to transform Iowa’s courts into a totally paperless system. She stated, “Just imagine the benefits. Iowans will be able to search and view entire court files online, around-the-clock, from the convenience of their own homes, offices or local libraries.” She appealed to lawyers by stating, “E-filing means no more last minute dashes or long drives to the courthouse to file papers.” I support Judge Ternus’ goal and find it difficult to believe anyone would disagree with its merits.
Judge Ternus also pointed out that while a paperless system will provide substantial benefits, it also raises personal privacy concerns. She commented, “But after the judicial branch shifts to electronic filing and record management, court records will be readily available for unconstrained, global public consumption.” Asking for direction to address these concerns and to allow the Judicial branch to move forward in their plans, Judge Ternus urged the Legislature “give this your full attention this Legislative Session.”
The House State Government Committee has heard from two speakers on this topic. Kathleen Richardson of the Iowa Freedom of Information Council talked about her concerns with recent open meeting and open record violations in Iowa, including the CIETC scandal and the Iowa Board of Regents’ hiring of a new president at the University of Iowa. Also speaking to the committee was Arthur Bonfield, a retired law professor at the University of Iowa. Professor Bonfield was instrumental in drafting Iowa’s original open meeting and open record laws and was able to highlight several glitches in Iowa’s current laws. Bonfield encouraged the Legislature to form a commission to broadly review the rules and laws as a whole as opposed to taking a band-aid approach to fixing problems.
Hopefully a broad review as suggested by Professor Bonfield would allow the Legislature to craft state policies that would strike a balance between Iowan’s strong desire for open government, as well as an equally strong desire for security and privacy. A key consideration to address is whether policies on paper public records and records on the internet should differ. We must develop basic guidelines for what is unacceptable to be public in any venue (i.e. social security numbers, financial information, minor children’s names or medical records). It may be more difficult to determine if other information should be open to public scrutiny (i.e. addresses, details of family disputes, and employment history).
The advent of the internet and recent abuses of public meetings and records is cause for the Iowa Legislature to reconsider its open meeting and open records laws. The goal of the Legislature is to create policies applicable to all levels and branches of government.
Human Cloning bill advances; Anti-bullying bill returns to House
Last week my article discussed the anti-bullying bill that passed the House. The Senate stripped off most of the amendments, so the bill has returned to the House where it will likely be debated next week. Without the amendments I anticipate the bill will receive fewer than the 62 votes it received the first time it was debated in the House. Also, last week the Senate narrowly passed the bill to remove the ban on therapeutic cloning in Iowa. I expect that bill to be debated in the House this week as well. Thank you to the great number of you who have written to me on these pieces of legislation.
As always, you can contact me in the following ways:
E-mail: carmine.boal@legis.state.ia.us
Home Address: 3301 SW Timber Green Road, Ankeny
Home Phone: 964-3335