Political watchdog and open records groups filed a lawsuit Wednesday seeking to force California officials to provide the state computer database for tracking thousands of votes and pieces of legislation.
The California First Amendment Coalition and MAPLight.org charged that the state legislative counsel's office is violating California's open records law by refusing to hand over the database.
The legislative counsel maintains the California Legislation Information Web site for all bills introduced in the state Assembly and Senate.
The First Amendment Coalition and MAPLight.org – a Berkeley group that follows money in politics – said the Web site doesn't allow sophisticated searches tracking lawmakers and multiple bills. The groups filed public records requests seeking access to the database used to compile the information.
Legislative Counsel Diane Boyer-Vine refused the request, asserting in a letter to MAPLight.org in July that the California Public Records Act "does not require disclosure of the database itself."
Daniel Newman, MAPLight.org's executive director, said the state's position makes it exceedingly more difficult for public interest groups to track legislation and reveal the connection between campaign contributions and lawmakers' votes.
"It is as if the legislative counsel is giving us a 10,000 page printout (in material posted on the Web) but not the computer spread sheets the information is printed from," Newman said. "The law is that the government has to give the public records in any format it possesses."
Peter Scheer, executive director of the California First Amendment Coalition, said state officials appear more interested in protecting lawmakers from potential embarrassment than in providing citizens full disclosure on the political process.
"The office of the Legislative Counsel is obviously afraid that release of the legislative database … will make it too easy for voters to connect financial contributions by special interests to specific votes and other accommodating actions by legislators," Scheer said in a statement.
Call Peter Hecht, Bee Capitol Bureau, (916) 326-5539.
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