Journalists involved in the audit asked for four types of documents -- crime logs and incident reports, a list of public employees' salaries, and court files of sex offenders. Under Indiana's open records law each document must be released. The law only allows officials to deny requests for trade secrets, university research and certain educational and medical records are exempt. Additionally, when individuals request records, they are not required to disclose their name, motives for the request or any other personal information.
During the audit, journalists found that sheriffs complied with requests the least -- they provided 60 percent of crime logs and 43 percent of incident reports. County court clerks were better, disclosing the sex offenders' files in 87 of 92 counties. County auditors released public salaries in 66 percent of counties, although not in the requested electronic format. This is an improvement over a similar audit that occurred in 1997, after which an Office of Public Access Counselor was created. Unfortunately, there are no civil or criminal penalties for public officials who repeatedly violate the law. A denied requestor's only recourse is filing a lawsuit.
Julia Vaughn of Common Cause Indiana explains, "The public shouldn’t have to jump through multiple hoops to get information." Although it appears that access in Indiana is improving, there is still much to be done so that the public receives equal access to all information that is required to be public.
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