Louisiana is considering legislation, SB 213, which would have the state outsource its state web site to a contractor in order to improve access by the public. The current web site is "hard to navigate", and the proposed solution moves its operations out of direct control of state employees.
The concern is that once the system is no longer directly under control of the government, that records which were previously public records would become records under the direct control of the contractor. From NOLA.com, "Internet records bill gets heavy editing", from May 24, 2011:
Carl Redman, executive editor of The Advocate newspaper in Baton Rouge, lobbyists for the Louisiana Press Association, Robert Travis Scott, president of the Public Affairs Research Council, and Robert Buckman, a communications professor at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette representing the Society of Professional Journalists, said that even with the amendments there is still concern that records now public could become off limits in the hands of a contractor.
As context for this, I give you a request I made for records from the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority for information kept by its contractor, Republic Parking, on details of municipal parking lot occupancy on a moment by moment basis during the day. The request was denied, and it was impossible for me to tell based on the response whether that was because the contractor didn't keep track of these details, or simply that they did not report these details to the agency. Records kept internal to the contractor on a contract with a public agency do not magically become public records, even if they could become public records were the agency request that they be produced in fulfillment of the contract.
Thanks to Suffolk Media Law for the heads up.
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