GOP Ohio gov signs bill that could charge public up to $750 for access to 'public records'

03 January

In Ohio, residents have been debating the merits of a controversial bill that allows government to charge fees for access to videos from law enforcement agencies, including bodycam footage.

Critics of the bill have been arguing that making access to the videos does the public a disservice. But on Thursday, January 2, conservative Republican Gov. Mike DeWine signed the bill into law.

Law enforcement could charge people for the "estimated cost" of processing the video — and you would have to pay before the footage is released. Governments could charge up to $75 an hour for work, with a fee cap of $750 per request. Legal experts say this could affect access to video from dash and body cameras, as well as surveillance video from inside jails — which are public records in Ohio.

Morgan Trau, a reporter for Cleveland's ABC Channel 5, explains, "Law enforcement could charge people for the 'estimated cost' of processing the video — and you would have to pay before the footage is released. Governments could charge up to $75 an hour for work, with a fee cap of $750 per request. Legal experts say this could affect access to video from dash and body cameras, as well as surveillance video from inside jails — which are public records in Ohio."

Trau describes a conversation he had with DeWine during a press conference in December.

When Trau mentioned transparency concerns about the bill, the GOP governor responded that providing law enforcement footage in response to a request requires time and effort.

DeWine told Trau, "These requests certainly should be honored, and we want them to be honored. We want them to be honored in a swift way; that's very, very important. We also, though — if you have, for example, a small police department, very small police department — and they get a request like that, that could take one person a significant period of time."

When Trau noted that it was "already hard enough to get video for journalists," DeWine replied, "Well, once again, we have close to 1000 police departments in the state of Ohio. Some of them are very small. What this amendment — again, I've not made a decision about this — but what this amendment would do is allow them to recover some of the cost that is involved. This is a very heavy burden."

Although he said he was undecided in December, DeWine ultimately decided to support the bill and sign it into law.

Read Morgan Trau's full article for Cleveland's ABC Channel 5 at this link.

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