Public Records Requests

Public Records Requests; Prohibiting an agency from charging a certain fee under a specified circumstance; providing that custodians of public records may rely solely on certain required safeguards to determine whether records are partly or wholly exempt from disclosure; increasing the maximum civil penalty allowed for certain violations related to public records; requiring that courts set immediate hearings on certain actions and give such hearings priority over all other pending cases until specified conditions are satisfied; providing that a complainant is not required to provide a certain written notice to an agency when the initial public records request was furnished to the agency’s custodian in written form, by e-mail, or through the agency’s website, etc.