Watchdogs worry a Nebraska Supreme Court ruling could lead to high fees for open records

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska Supreme Court on Friday ruled in favor of a state government agency that sought to charge a news organization nearly $45,000 for public records on water pollution, leading to concerns that exorbitant fees could be used to keep information from the public.

The high court found that state law allows special fees to comply with records requests that take more than four hours to compile.

Matthew Hansen, the editor of the nonprofit news provider Flatwater Free Press at the center of the case, panned Friday’s ruling in an editorial, calling it a blow to Nebraska’s public records law.

“This clears the way for the state of Nebraska to charge us an ungodly amount of money to gain access to public records related to the state’s growing nitrate-in-groundwater problem,” Hansen wrote. “This decision is a blow to Nebraska’s public records law, a law written to protect media outlets like ours and Nebraskans like yourselves from the secrecy of those who hold power.”

The ruling came during Sunshine Week, an observance of the importance of public access to government information. A nationwide review of procedures by The Associated Press and CNHI News revealed a patchwork of complicated systems for resolving open government disputes that often put the burden of enforcing transparency laws on private citizens.

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