Bettendorf city officials want to begin charging for preparing and copying public records requested by citizens.
State law allows cities to charge a "reasonable" fee for complying with public record requests, and City Administrator Decker Ploehn told alderman the proposed ordinance is needed because of an increase in the number of requests for public records.
He estimated his office received between five and 10 requests during the past year. Both he and City Attorney Greg Jager blame email, and the need to sort through large numbers of emails, as a new, time-consuming issue when it comes to responding to public record requests.
Under the proposed ordinance, if the time spent responding to the public record request is 15 minutes or less, there would be no charge other than copying costs. The total hourly charges also would be reduced by 50 percent.
The rate for copying material (10 cents per page for black-and-white copies and $1 per page for color copies) is listed in the proposed ordinance, but no hourly rates are listed for city staff who will be responding to open records requests.
The council discussed the proposed ordinance at its Sept. 7 meeting, and agreed to table to matter for two weeks to obtain additional information on what other cities charge for similar services.
CLICK HERE for a copy of the proposed ordinance.
