The Indiana Publisher

Page XXXX, 2014 Page 6 June 8, 2017 wasn't sympathetic to HSPA argu- ments over the value of published public notices. I also wasn't sur- prised, but pleased, that bill sponsor Sen. Luke Kenley, R-Noblesville, who used to operate the family's grocery business and has been a friend of newspapers, agreed to remove the offending provision when the bill traveled through the Senate. Unfortunately, Rep. Cook's inten- tion won out when the bill's confer- ence committee version was decided. More ominous to me though was the comment made by Sen. Kenley to the Senate Rules Committee as he explained the final version of the bill. The bill "does eliminate require- ment to publish in the newspaper and does require you to go onto the school corporation's website, which is kind of a breakthrough decision and… it is just a question of when this is going to happen." Kenley said. "When we are going to go to these kind of things, it does save pretty significant money on a statewide basis." The conference committee report was passed by the House 96-2 and the Senate 47-3. Gov. Eric Holcomb signed the bill into law on April 28. HSPA supported H.E.A. 1272, authored by Rep. Sharon Negele, R-Attica. The bill allows government units to proceed with a meeting, when newspapers fail to publish notice, by posting notice in the community. Sen. Blake Doriot, R-Goshen, was the bill's Senate sponsor. HSPA's position was based on equity. It would be unfair to public government units to force them to reschedule meetings when the fault was with the newspaper for failing to properly publish the public notice advertisement. The House passed the bill, 95-0, and the Senate, 45-3. Gov. Holcomb signed the bill into law on April 5. Public Access For the third time, HSPA worked with Speaker of the House Brian Bosma, R-Indianapolis, to pass lan- guage that would guarantee the pub- lic's ability to obtain public records via email with no copying fee, but also create a search fee for voluminous records requests (those that took more than two hours to find the records). Gov. Eric Holcomb vetoed the bill (H.B. 1523) due to the search fee, which should put the search fee to bed for the rest of his term. Rep. Kathy Richardson, R-Noblesville, authored the bill for the Speaker. The House Government and Regulatory Reform Committee passed the bill 7-1. The House voted for it, 62-25. Co-authors were Reps. Phil GiaQuinta, D-Fort Wayne; Karen Engleman, R-Georgetown; and Kevin Mahan, R-Hartford City. The Senate Local Government Committee voted for it, 7-0. The Senate passed it 44-3. The lead sponsor was Sen. Rodric Bray, R-Martinsville. Other sponsors were Sens. Jim Merritt, R-Indianapolis; and Tim Lanane, D-Anderson. Rep. Richardson filed a motion to concur and the House approved the Senate version of the bill, 63-27. Gov. Holcomb vetoed the bill on April 24. HSPA had worked with Bosma on multiple ways to limit the impact of a search fee – $20 cap on hourly rate, first two hours of search would be free, computer run time not included, review and redaction time not includ- ed. At least 27 states and the federal Freedom of Information Act do include search fees. Two secrecy pieces were inserted into the budget bill (H.E.A. 1001). A new concept, Request for Information (RFI), has been created for potential public-private agreements. The RFI is published as a public notice, but the submissions are confidential, except for who submitted the ideas. HSPA worked with bill sponsor Sen. Luke Kenley, R-Noblesville, to get the names disclosable. RFI's can become the basis for Requests for Proposals. HSPA's concern is manipulation of the RFP to favor a particular company and the delay in the public's knowl- edge of what will be proposed. The sooner proposed concepts are made known to those impacted by these ideas, the sooner the public can voice its support or concern. If the concept isn't revealed until the point where an RFP is issued, often public officials have hardened their position and reluctant to listen to public input. The second item was inserted in the budget bill's conference commit- tee report at the request of Purdue University. The language exempts its operation of Kaplan University from the Open Door Law, Access to Public Records Act and state Board of Accounts audit. HSPA executive director and general counsel Steve Key hasn't heard what he feels is a good policy argument for why part of Purdue University's operations should be exempt from the state's public access laws and state audit. The conference committee report on the bill was passed by the House, 68-30. Rep. Tim Brown, R-Crawfordsville, was the bill's author and Sen. Kenley was the Republican sponsor. The Senate passed the com- mittee report, 42-8. Gov. Holcomb signed it into law on April 27. HSPA worked with author Rep. Greg Steuerwald, R-Danville, to get all applications for Marion County judge vacancies available to the public in H.E.A. 1036. The original bill was unclear as to which applications would be available and when. Co-author Ed Delaney, D-Indianapolis, and sponsor Sen. Rodric Bray, R-Martinsville, were also helpful in the negotiations over the transparency language in the bill. The conference committee report was approved by the House, 69-30, and the Senate, 28-22. Gov. Holcomb signed the bill into law on April 28. H.E.A. 1431 specifies that newly elected public officials can attend executive sessions prior to them officially taking office. Rep. Phil GiaQuinta, D-Fort Wayne, authored the bill. While the bill was in the Senate, HSPA also worked with the universities on language allow- ing their Board of Trustees to meet behind closed doors to discuss poten- tial collaborative agreements with private entities. Rep. GiaQuinta filed a motion to concur with the Senate version, which was passed by the House, 84-3. Rep. Matt Lehman, R-Berne, was the co-author. The Senate passed the bill, 50-0. Sen. Linda Brown, R-Fort Wayne, was the bill's sponsor. Gov. Holcomb signed the bill on April 26. HSPA supported the efforts of Rep. Mike Speedy, R-Indianapolis, to require large cities and counties to post roll call votes on their websites in H.E.A. 1622. The bill's conference committee report was approved by the House, 92-0, and by the Senate, 45-1. Sens. Jack Sandlin, R-Indianapolis; and Aaron Freeman, R-Indianapolis; were the sponsors. Gov. Holcomb signed the bill on April 26. HSPA spoke to Sen. Dennis Kruse, R-Auburn, about his bill allowing hospitals to create police departments (S.E.A. 112). The language makes no provision for public access to informa- tion about crimes in private hospitals. Sen. Kruse understood the problem, but didn't want to address it in his bill. The same could be said for Sen. Michael Crider, R-Freenfield, who chaired the Senate homeland Security and Transportation Committee, which approved the bill, 7-0. The Senate passed the bill, 45-2. Rep. Bob Morris, R-Fort Wayne, was the bill's sponsor. He also didn't volunteer to address the account- ability provision. The House passed the bill, 92-2. Kruse filed a motion to concur on the Senate changes and the Senate approved that version of the bill, 48-0. Gov. Holcomb signed the bill on April 21. HSPA supported S.EA. 120 authored by Sen. Eric Koch, R-Bedford, that clarified that plea agreements are disclosable docu- ments, even if the judge doesn't approve them. Fuzzy language in the Indiana Code had confused the issue. The Senate passed the bill, 49-0. Co-sponsors were Sens. Rodric Bray, R-Martinsville; and Lonnie Randolph, D-East Chicago. House sponsor was Rep. Greg Steuerwald, R-Danville. The House passed the bill 96-0. Gov. Holcomb signed the bill April 13. Sen. Rodric Bray, R-Martinsville, agreed to amend S.E.A. 505, when HSPA pointed out that language would have allowed county recorders to include overhead costs as part of a formula for copying fees. The Senate passed the bill 45-4. Rep. Dennis Zent, R-Angola, was the bill's sponsor. The House passed the bill, 95-0. Sen. Bray filed the motion to concur and the Senate passed the House version, 39-9. Gov. Holcomb signed the bill April 21. HSPA opposed H.B. 1248, authored by Rep. Mike Karickhoff, R-Kokomo, which would have exempted admin- istrative function meetings by county commissioners from the Open Door Law. Rep. Karickhoff agreed not to push for a committee hearing when HSPA pledged to work with him dur- ing the summer to better define the term "administrative functions" in the Open Door Law. The bill died for lack of a hearing in the House Government and Regulatory Reform Committee, chaired by Rep. Kevin Mahan, R-Hartford City. HSPA worked on amendment with H.E.A. 1470 author Rep. David Ober, R-Albion, to resolve concerns with language concerning confidentiality of information handled by a new man- agement performance hub of the state Office of Management and Budget. The bill's intent is to make better use of data to make government more effi- cient and develop solutions to policy problems. The conference committee report on H.E.A. 1470 was approved by the House, 93-2, and the Senate, 37-13. Gov. Holcomb signed the bill on May 2.Sen. Brandt Hershman, R-Buck Creek, was the sponsor. HSPA offered Sen. Jim Merritt, R-Indianapolis, an amendment to assist in his effort to track overdose deaths in Indiana as a part of S.B. 74 by including the information in the coroner's report. Sen. Merritt accepted the amendment but then decided to go in another direction to collect the information. His bill died in the Senate Committee on Appropriations, chaired by Sen. Luke Kenley, R-Noblesville. HSPA Session Continued from Page 1 See Session, Page 7 The gavel struck at 11:29pm on April 21 to signify Sine Die. (Photo: Staff) HSPA Legislative Assistant, Sarah Elser. (Photo: Ruth Witmer)

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