Your Right to Know: Guides help public navigate openness laws

You ask for a record from your local government, you get it. You want to attend a meeting of a public body, you can walk right in.

Much of the time, it’s that simple. Wisconsin’s open records law entitles residents to most records regarding the affairs of government, and its open meetings law creates a default presumption that all governmental meetings are open.

But what happens when things get complicated? Say your request for records is denied or delayed, or you are asked to pay exorbitant fees. What if you arrive at the meeting only to be told the discussion on the topic you’re interested in is closed?

Fortunately, Wisconsin residents seeking to understand the open records and meetings laws have at their fingertips a valuable resource: the Wisconsin Department of Justice’s Public Records and Open Meetings compliance guides.

These guides have been maintained across the administrations of several Wisconsin attorneys general, updated every few years. In May, for the first time since 2019, the guides were updated again, under Attorney General Josh Kaul.

That’s good news, because the law as set down in statutes and case law has in some cases changed since 2019. So has the technology that government agencies use to keep records and store information.

The guides for records and meetings — 99 and 50 pages, respectively,— provide basic information, from what is a “record” to the definition of a “governmental body” subject to the open meetings law. They include citations to statutes and case law, as well as links to where readers can access the source documents for themselves.

But the guides go further. For example, the public records guide explains when records requests can be denied, whether and how people discussed in records must be notified before release, and special issues related to electronic records, fees and enforcement.

The open meetings guide delves into how governmental entities must give notice of upcoming meetings, when and how they can go into closed session, and the requirement that meetings be accessible to members of the public. It also includes a verified open meetings complaint form that can be filed with the district attorney, which is the first step in seeking enforcement of an open meetings violation.

Do the guides answer every question? No. The laws are continually being amended by legislation and tested by litigation, and the courts have not sorted out every problem area. But the guides do serve to answer a lot of questions, and they assist the attorney general in his or her statutory duty to interpret these laws.

Other resources are available on the department’s website, courtesy of its Office of Open Government. Under a unique feature of Wisconsin law, residents can also seek advice from the AG’s office and most of the time receive a written reply. You can contact the office by phone, email or letter.

Could the attorney general do more to strengthen these laws? Certainly. No attorney general has filed an enforcement case since approximately 2006, and it sometimes takes months or even years to get responses to requests for interpretation or enforcement.

That is why it is so valuable to have the public records and open meetings compliance guides, which discuss the laws and their interpretation in great detail.

So before throwing up your hands when your request is denied or your meeting is closed, check out the compliance guides. They might just have the answers you’re looking for.

Your Right to Know is a monthly column distributed by the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council (wisfoic.org), a nonprofit, nonpartisan group dedicated to open government. Christa Westerberg is the council’s vice president and a partner at the Pines Bach law firm in Madison.