Coordinator will assist public with process
Okanogan County is hiring a public records coordinator and investing in software to manage and fill public records requests, which have increased significantly in recent years.
The county commissioners authorized a contract with Next
-Request for software that will track all requests, provide redaction tools, and alert staff about deadlines. The annual cost is about $10,800. The commissioners approved the expenditure at their meeting on Feb. 21.
Public Records Act
Washington’s Public Records Act requires that all public records maintained by state and local agencies be made available to all members of the public, with very narrow exemptions.
Public records include anything prepared, owned, used or retained by any state or local government agency in the conduct of government. Records can include writing, photos, maps, videos, voicemails, web and social media content, emails, text messages and tweets, according to the Municipal Research and Services Center (MRSC), a nonprofit that provides legal and policy guidance to Washington governments.
Records exempt from disclosure include personal information that would violate a right to privacy. Standard performance reviews are also exempt, but disciplinary records that reflect substantiated allegations of employee misconduct are not, according to MRSC.
County staff evaluated three software companies. NextRequest has the most useful features and is less expensive, Human Resources/Risk Manager Shelley Keitzman told the commissioners. At the click of a button, NextRequest enables a user to know the status of a document search and when the request has been fulfilled, she said. Ultimately, they expect the software will save the county time and money, Keitzman said.
In the past year, records requests submitted through the county’s online portal went up about 30%, Keitzman said. The Okanogan County Sheriff’s Officed filled more than 800 requests last year, up from about 600 the previous year.
The software will also help the Sheriff’s Office produce reports required by state agencies, some of which take weeks to compile, particularly given extensive redaction of sensitive information, Keitzman said.
Having a records coordinator should help streamline the process by assisting the public in crafting a well-defined request and weeding out overly broad requests that can overwhelm staff, Keitzman said.
In the past, because requests have come to Okanogan County through various channels — some go to the clerk of the board, some directly to a county department — there hasn’t been a comprehensive system to ensure that requests are tracked throughout the process, Keitzman said. Not only is that time-consuming, but it can also lead to liability issues, she said.
Funding the records coordinator and software has been made possible by the fact that Okanogan County has more money in its budget because of increased revenues from sales tax and higher interest rates and conservative planning, Okanogan County Commissioner Andy Hover told the Methow Valley News.
It’s imperative to ensure that the county is fulfilling all its obligations with regard to records requests and to protect the county from liability, Hover said. The county has been sued over records requests in the past, he said.
New records fees
The commissioners adopted a new fee schedule for public records that allows the county to charge for electronic records, now the majority of requests, Chief Civil Deputy Esther Milner told the commissioners at their Feb. 14 public hearing.
Okanogan County was “behind the times,” and these changes will allow the county to recoup costs for scanning and for locating and attaching emails and other electronic records, Milner said.
The county’s updated fees, which match state fees, are 15 cents per page for photocopies or printouts, 10 cents per scanned page, and 5 cents for each group of four electronic files emailed or uploaded to a server, with additional fees for large files.
Fees will be posted on the county website and adjusted whenever state fees change. The county may choose to waive fees under a certain amount, such as $1 or $2, Hover said.
Milner has been reviewing the county’s public records code and will most likely propose more amendments in the future.
In response to public comments, the commissioners discussed creating a dedicated page on the county website for legal notices and related documents so that members of the public can easily obtain information to provide input. That would save individual staff members from having to respond to multiple requests for documents, Milner said.
While some of these materials are already on the county website, they can be difficult to find, even for a tech-savvy user, Hover said.
The new software should be up and running in early March. The county hopes to hire a coordinator by the end of March, Keitzman said.
