ENGROSSED

Senate Bill No. 97

(By Senator Burdette, Mr. President)

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[Introduced January 24, 1994;

referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.]

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A BILL to amend and reenact sections two and four, article one, chapter twenty-nine-b of the code of West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as amended, all relating to the freedom of information law; redefining the term "public body"; redefining the term "public records"; requiring public bodies claiming an exemption from disclosure of internal memoranda or letters to provide an index of the document or portion of document claimed exempt and an explanation of the basis of such exemption; creating an exemption for information contained in the Legislature's computer system; and providing for certain exceptions upon the payment of reasonable user fees.

Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That sections two and four, article one, chapter twenty-nine-b of the code of West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as amended, be amended and reenacted, all toread as follows:
ARTICLE 1. PUBLIC RECORDS.
§29B-1-2. Definitions.
As used in this article:
(1) "Custodian" means the elected or appointed official charged with administering a public body.
(2) "Person" includes any natural person, corporation, partnership, firm or association.
(3) "Public body" means every state officer, agency, department, including the executive, legislative and judicial departments, division, bureau, board and commission; every county and city governing body, school district, special district, municipal corporation, and any board, department, commission, council or agency thereof; any other body which is created by state or local authority or which is primarily funded by the state or local authority; and any other body which performs a public function on behalf of a public body including, but not limited to, any entity whose principal purpose is to support one or more programs, facilities, or research or educational opportunities offered by public institutions of higher education.
(4) "Public record" includes any writing containing information relating to the conduct of the public's business, prepared, owned and retained by a public body, and expressly includes records of expenditures of funds of a public body but excludes records identifying any donors of gifts or the amounts thereof.
(5) "Writing" includes any books, papers, maps, photographs, cards, tapes, recordings or other documentary materials regardless of physical form or characteristics.
§29B-1-4. Exemptions.
The following categories of information are specifically exempt from disclosure under the provisions of this article:
(1) Trade secrets, as used in this section, which may include, but are not limited to, any formula, plan pattern, process, tool, mechanism, compound, procedure, production data, or compilation of information which is not patented which is known only to certain individuals within a commercial concern who are using it to fabricate, produce or compound an article or trade or a service or to locate minerals or other substances, having commercial value, and which gives its users an opportunity to obtain business advantage over competitors;
(2) Information of a personal nature such as that kept in a personal, medical or similar file, if the public disclosure thereof would constitute an unreasonable invasion of privacy, unless the public interest by clear and convincing evidence requires disclosure in the particular instance: Provided, That nothing in this article shall be construed as precluding an individual from inspecting or copying his own personal, medical or similar file;
(3) Test questions, scoring keys and other examination data used to administer a licensing examination, examination for employment or academic examination;
(4) Records of law-enforcement agencies that deal with the detection and investigation of crime and the internal records and notations of such law-enforcement agencies which are maintained for internal use in matters relating to law enforcement;
(5) Information specifically exempted from disclosure by statute;
(6) Records, archives, documents or manuscripts describing the location of undeveloped historic, prehistoric, archaeological, paleontological and battlefield sites or constituting gifts to any public body upon which the donor has attached restrictions on usage or the handling of which could irreparably damage such record, archive, document or manuscript;
(7) Information contained in or related to examination, operating or condition reports prepared by, or on behalf of, or for the use of any agency responsible for the regulation or supervision of financial institutions, except those reports which are by law required to be published in newspapers;
(8) Internal memoranda or letters received or prepared by any public body: Provided, That any public body claiming that such internal memoranda or letters or any portion thereof are exempt shall provide the person requesting information with an itemization and index of the document or portion of the document claimed to be exempt, a statement of the exemption claimed and an explanation of the basis of the claimed exemption; and
(9) Information contained on the Legislature's computer system except that the Legislature may allow access to thisinformation upon the payment of user fees as approved by the joint committee on government and finance.