That's what so important about changing the way our Commonwealth perceives public records. It's what makes last week's stall tactics in the state House so confusing.
Early last week, the state Senate unanimously gave its approval to a new Right to Know law that would increase and strengthen governmental accountability in regard to a variety of matters, including spending.
Gov. Ed Rendell has said he would sign the bill but it needed to pass the House first. That's where it sits at press time.
Pennsylvania's current open records law is one of the worst in the country. Our Commonwealth's Freedom of Information law ranked 48th of 50 states in a 2002 survey conducted by the Better Government Association.
What is before the state House, and has already passed the Senate, is a drastic change from what how our Commonwealth currently operates. It begins with the presumption that state and local agency records are open for public inspection and places the burden on a government agency to deny access.
For the first time since the Right to Know Law was passed in 1957, it will include the General Assembly and will give citizens the ability to appeal open records disputes to a newly-formed administrative agency - the Office of Open records - without the need to file court action.
Senate Bill 1 expands the definition of public records and encompasses the legislature in the law, opening financial and other records to citizens. It increase penalties for non-compliance, shortens agency response time for requests to five business days, subjects community colleges to the law and requires state-affiliated universities to make financial information public.
The bill makes public any record associated with third-party contractors which do governmental work and requires state contract information be available online in a searchable database.
We understand some of the qualms that members of the state House have with the new bill. We agree that the law could be strengthened some more but let's not be greedy. Pennsylvania's antiquated open records law needs to be changed and this is a huge step in the right direction. We're not saying it is perfect. It is a compromise and better than anything which has been proposed in 50 years.
This issue affects every person living in Pennsylvania. As homeowners, we would never pay a bill without first knowing why we're spending the money. We should maintain that same philosophy as taxpayers. We place a lot of trust in our elected officials but it should not be blind trust.
This new Open Records Law is just another form of a checks and balance system upon which our government was based and operates. It just adds the public back into the structure.