Right-To-Know Law (RTKL)
Under the current RTKL, all state and local government agency records are presumed to be public. This means that if an agency wants to withhold a record, it must prove that it is entitled to do so under the RTKL, another law or regulation, privilege (such as attorney-client privilege), or court order. Also, the current law established the Office of Open Records which makes it simple and free for a requester to appeal an agency denial.
Under the old law, the burden was on a requester to establish why a record was public. Also, all appeals went to court, which can be expensive and tends to be a far more time-consuming process than an appeal to the OOR.
Click here to learn more about open records laws in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
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