Bills modifying Public Records Act headed to Inslee

OLYMPIA — Two bills modifying the state’s Public Records Act are headed to the governor for signing.

The state House of Representatives on Monday took final votes on legislation to allow collection of new fees for digital records, to assist government agencies with training and record keeping technology, and to study the value of creating an online portal through which many documents of public agencies could be posted.

Under House Bill 1594, the offices of the attorney general and state archivist would provide consultation and training for local agencies on properly handling requests. Also, grants would be available to local governments to acquire new technology for processing requests. And it authorizes a study of the merits of creating a portal for public records.

Under House Bill 1595, a request for all or substantially all records of an agency could be rejected as too broad. And this bill contains new fees including 10 cents per page scanned into an electronic format and 10 cents per gigabyte of data.

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