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Abstract

Government records are fuel for the engine of investigative reporting. Using documents obtained through freedom-of-information requests, journalists regularly expose waste, mismanagement, and corruption across every level of government, from Cabinet-level federal agencies to the tiniest local police department. The Supreme Court of the United States has recognized the foundational role of accessible government documents “to ensure an informed citizenry, vital to the functioning of a democratic society, needed to check against corruption and to hold the governors accountable to the governed.” But records are notoriously challenging to obtain. Government agencies take advantage of every available loophole—and lobby legislators to create new ones—to frustrate requests for documents that might reveal embarrassing secrets. Whether because of chronic understaffing or purposeful “slow-walking,” requests for public records can take months to fulfill—or sometimes, even years. One habitual obstacle that gets between the public and essential government information is cost. State and federal open-records laws provide that agencies may assess fees for fulfilling requests. Prohibitively large price quotes are legendary; a Florida sheriff’s department once told reporters it would cost $399,000 to retrieve, search, and produce five months’ worth of employees’ emails. Fees of this magnitude are tantamount to denial, meaning that important news may never be reported. As news organizations increasingly struggle to pay their bills just to stay in business, writing a four-, five-, or even six-figure check for government records understandably may seem like an unaffordable luxury. …

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