Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA)

From the LT celebrating public access to public records.
Light let in on access to public records
Sunshine Week calls attention to Freedom of Information Act
By Candy Czernicki
Chippewa Falls News Bureau

Sunshine Week couldn't come at a better time, with most Chippewa Valley residents longing for an end to gray skies and snow.

But the annual event has less to do with cheering up winter-weary people and more with shining a bright light on free and open access to public records.

Sunshine Week, sponsored yearly by media, government and education partners, is designed to call attention to the Freedom of Information Act, signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson on July 4, 1966. It was amended in 2002.

A variety of public records are available for Chippewa Valley residents to inspect, including property ownership, motor vehicle, voter registration, political contributions and court proceedings. Most record searches involve a trip to the county courthouse.

Court records, including criminal, civil, traffic and probate cases, remain in a state online database for anywhere from five to 100 years, depending on the type of case. It's still not enough to help de-clutter most clerk of courts offices.

"I was just at a meeting on remodeling in conjunction with the jail," said Diana Miller, Eau Claire County clerk of courts. "I was thinking, 'Oh, my, what am I going to do for storage?' I don't think we have enough space in the room for this year's records."

Records of cases long past reside in "dead storage" or are microfilmed, Miller said, but "the wave of the future is scanning records. We would have the ability to do that now - we can even get the equipment free - but we don't have the staff. I did ask two years in a row for the staff to do that, but that's just not been in the budget."

The Wisconsin Supreme Court is expected to approve a petition regarding the use of electronic signatures, which usually involves the acceptance of a person's typed rather than handwritten name, and electronic filing. Once that happens, "electronic filing will be opened up," Miller said.

"It's a great feature and hopefully a time-saver for our office. We do pull records a lot."

Currently those records cost money, from $1.25 per page for copies to $5 for a clerk-assisted records search.

"We're trying to be reasonable about giving people access to information, but at some point you have to pay for it," Miller said.

Scanned records would be available at a public access computer linked to the Wisconsin Circuit Court Access Web site, known as CCAP, for Consolidated Court Automation Programs.

Karen Hepfler, Chippewa County clerk of courts, said that while scanning would help with space issues, "we would like to start scanning as well for certain types of records routinely requested - perhaps not the whole file but a judgment of conviction or final divorce judgment."

Easier access to those records would help county clerk's office staff and residents, Hepfler said.

"Most folks request personal records," she said. "Usually sometime in the future (after a case has been settled) they find out from a new employer or at a job interview that they would like that information, and they don't have their copy any longer.

"A lot of times, different branches of the military come in for that reason as well, to assist folks going into the service in getting all the documents before they go in."

Czernicki can be reached at 723-0303 or candy. czernicki@ecpc.com.