Alabama lawmakers advance bill to strengthen state’s weak open records law

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — The Alabama Senate on Thursday advanced legislation aimed at strengthening the state’s weak open records law by setting deadlines to respond to requests to view public documents.

Senators voted 29-0 for the legislation. The bill now moves to the House.

“Right now, under current law, it’s the wild west. We don’t have timelines for governments or universities to respond in due time,” Republican Sen. Arthur Orr, the bill’s sponsor, said.

Alabama’s public records law says any citizen has the right to inspect and take copies of public writings, except for those exempted by law. However, it does not provide deadlines for responses.

The legislation would require a public records officer to acknowledge the receipt of a simple request within 10 days and then “provide a substantive response” to the request within 15 additional business days. Public entities would be given more time to respond to requests that would require more than eight hours of work to fulfill.

Civil lawsuits would continue to be the only avenue for settling disputes. The bill sets out timeframes for when a request is presumed to be denied because of a failure to respond, allowing a person to move forward with a lawsuit.

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