Matt Kadosh is a journalist with TAPinto Newark, where this first appeared.

A controversial bill that would be the first update to New Jersey’s Open Public Records Act in over two decades has drawn the ire of community activists in Newark, who said it will make it more difficult to get public information about local government.

A local teachers union, a civil rights group, and an organization that advocates for police accountability voiced objections to the bill, S2930, while the custodian of records for New Jersey’s largest city said she sits in the middle of the debate. Additional amendments may be considered at a Thursday, March 14, Senate budget committee hearing in Trenton.

The proposed law would broaden the swath of public documents that could be made inaccessible to the public and change how attorney fees are awarded in public records disputes. It would also appropriate $8 million, including monies to move certain documents online and pay salaries for members of the Government Records Council, an entity which resolves certain OPRA disputes.

“The Newark Teachers Union opposes the bill in its current form,” said John M. Abeigon, president of the Newark Teachers Union in a statement to TAPinto Newark. “Democracy and transparency are not easy things to defend, especially in a society as addicted to litigation as ours has become.

“However, as a public union currently involved in an OPRA war with the state’s largest school district, the NTU trusts that a bipartisan modified OPRA bill can be agreed upon that does not water down our rights to obtain the facts.”

In that dispute, the Teachers Union has sought the release of a publicly funded report by the firm CREED Strategies that examines racial tensions at Global Studies High School. The Newark Branch of the civil rights organization the NAACP, which has repeatedly called for the release of the CREED Strategies report, also opposes the legislation.

“At a time when citizens are questioning whether we will maintain our democracy or face authoritarianism, this is another slap in the face of our democracy,” Deborah Smith Gregory, president of the Newark Branch of the NAACP, told TAPinto Newark. “The government must be accountable to the people. The ability to OPRA information is part of that accountability.  This is a government of the people, not of government officials who dictate to us.”

Newark Communities for Accountable Policing (N-CAP) registered its opposition in a statement issued before the hearing.

“Accountability and Trust of the Police cannot happen without transparency,” Zayid Muhammad, principal organizer for N-CAP, said in an open letter to the Essex County delegation of the state Legislature. “Therefore, we insist that each of you say a resounding ‘NO’ to current efforts to gut this foundationally important legal space.”

City Clerk Kecia Daniels in a phone interview on Tuesday, March 12, said that the number of records requests the city receives has steadily been rising, with her office having gotten over 6,000 requests in 2021 and about the same number in 2022. Figures for 2023 are still being tallied, she said.

“It’s a balance between being transparent and having the resources necessary to respond to each and every request in a timely manner, so a lot of times with a municipality our size, we get a large number of requests, and we just don’t have the bandwidth to keep up,” Daniels said.

“We are responsible for getting documents from every department, and it’s an enormous task, so I’m square in the middle of both sides of the argument, but something has to change. There has to be some revision to the law for us to strike a balance.”

The most frequent requests, she said, are asks for police camera footage, which must be carefully reviewed before being released.

“Our volume is for public safety type requests,” Daniels said. “Everyone wants video. Everyone wants bodyworn camera footage, and it takes time.”

How are Newark legislators voting?

State Sen. M. Teresa Ruiz, D-Newark, on Monday, voted in favor of moving the measure forward. Ruiz was among legislators who left the more than eight-hour budget and appropriations committee session prior to the roll call on the OPRA bill. Voting in absentia is permitted in the Legislature. Requests seeking Ruiz’s comment on the bill were not returned on Monday and Tuesday.

Assemblywoman Garnet R. Hall, D-Maplewood, who represents parts of Newark, voted to release the bill from committee. The vote was 5-2, online legislative records show. Mary Theroux, the assemblywoman’s chief of staff, however, said Hall has reservations.

“She did vote ‘yes’ for the bill to release it from committee,” Theroux said. “She has some concerns about the bill, but she voted to release it so that a full discussion about the bill can take place with the Democratic caucus.”

Sessions of the Senate and Assembly are set for Monday, March 18.