A bill package that would expand some open records requests to include the executive branch passed through a House committee last week and is likely to receive support in the Legislature and from the governor. Legislators hope the bills will improve Michigan’s poor standing among other states in transparency.
“They are very likely to pass,” Gideon D’Assandro, a spokesperson for the Michigan House Republicans, said in an email. “Two years ago, a package of bills that was very nearly identical passed in ten separate unanimous votes. With 108 representatives present that day, the total vote on the bill package was 108-0.”
The transparency package includes House Bills 4007 through 4016. The first two bills make the executive branch subject to the state’s Freedom of Information Act in certain cases and the rest of the bills would create a new Legislative Open Records Act for the legislature. (Read more here…)