Bill > A2697

Introduced Session

This bill revises the open public records act (OPRA). The bill formally names OPRA as the "Martin O'Shea Open Public Records Act" in honor of Martin O'Shea, a tireless advocate for broad public access to government records. The bill expands and clarifies various definitions and makes changes to the duties of record custodians and the Government Records Council. It also revises the composition of the Government Records Council and changes the council from being in the Department of Community Affairs to being in, but not of, the Department of Community Affairs. It modifies the mediation process making the Office of Dispute Settlement in the Office of the Public Defender available to mediate disputes, changes the penalty provisions, and modifies access to the courts. It specifies that the fines imposed pursuant to OPRA cannot be paid out of public funds. The bill changes the membership of the Government Records Council to seven members. In addition, the bill requires the State to create a public finance website and establish the New Jersey Local Public Finance Internet Website Development Program to provide advice and technical assistance to units of local government that elect to create a searchable local public finance Internet website.

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Gordon Johnson (D)*,  Erik Peterson (R), 

Introduced, Referred to Assembly Judiciary Committee (on 02/08/2016)