To boos, shouts of “shame” and people angrily walking out of a hearing room at the Statehouse, a state Senate committee on Thursday approved the newest version of a fast-tracked bill opponents say would allow government in New Jersey to provide fewer public records to citizens and the media.Supporters say they need to “modernize” the act and that local government clerks are being overwhelmed with requests for records.
Griffin said this would have a chilling effect on how many attorneys would be willing to challenge governments for open records. John Donnadio of the New Jersey Association of Counties said the fees being awarded to attorneys in lawsuits that won against municipalities for withholding records were excessive.
At one point, a group of people accused Sarlo of “censoring” speakers as he demanded they could only talk on the amendments to the bill and not the bill in general.“Every amendment in the bill,” she shot back to a round of applause Sen. Andrew Zwicker, D-Somerset, the sole Democrat to vote against the legislation Thursday, opposed provisions that would allow government entities to put restraining orders against records requests they deemed too burdensome.