Concerning modifications to the "Colorado Open Records Act".
SB26-107 would make a series of changes to the Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) governing how public records requests are handled, what records are excluded from disclosure, and how fees and deadlines are applied. The bill expands the definition of records that are not considered “public records” to include certain communication documents produced by assistive technology for people with disabilities or for individuals with language barriers, when those records are created to facilitate communication in place of verbal communication. It also adds a new requirement that public entities post their CORA rules, records-retention policies, and public instructions for making records requests on a website, or physically post that information if no website exists.
The bill lengthens the standard response timeline for records requests from three working days to five, and extends the allowable extenuating-circumstances delay from seven to ten additional working days. It adds new delay provisions when the custodian or a necessary records-holder is not scheduled to work during the response period, while requiring the custodian to release any other available responsive records and notify the requester when the unavailable person is expected to return. SB26-107 also creates a special 30-working-day response period for requests determined to be for the direct solicitation of business for pecuniary gain, with a right to challenge that determination in district court, and it excludes certain labor-related requests from that category.
The bill also changes CORA’s fee rules. It allows custodians to charge for the reasonable cost of directly responding to requests deemed commercial solicitations, permits custodians to treat closely timed, facially similar requests from the same person as one request for fee purposes, and requires an additional hour of free research-and-retrieval time for each day a response is late. It further requires custodians to provide a reasonable breakdown of fee components on request, to accept credit card or electronic payment if the public entity already uses those methods for other services, and to ensure any prepayment or payment requirements are consistent with adopted rules and policies.
In addition, the bill broadens student privacy protections by prohibiting disclosure not only of public elementary and secondary school students’ addresses and telephone numbers, but also any other student information that could be used to directly contact a student by any means. Overall, the measure would alter both the timing and cost structure of CORA requests and add new posting, privacy, and administrative requirements for public entities and custodians.
The available context suggests the bill did not advance out of the Senate Committee on State, Veterans, & Military Affairs and was postponed indefinitely. No vote tally or committee transcript is provided, so the overall sentiment is best characterized as mixed to skeptical, with the bill appearing to have faced enough concern to stall in committee. Likely points of contention include the longer response deadlines, the new commercial-solicitation category and associated fees, and the added administrative burdens on custodians, balanced against transparency, payment flexibility, and privacy protections for students and people using assistive communication tools.
SB26-107 would amend multiple sections of CORA in Title 24, Article 72 of the Colorado Revised Statutes. It changes the definition of public records, modifies response deadlines and extension rules, adds new notice and posting obligations for public entities, expands student-record privacy protections, and revises fee, payment, and prepayment procedures for records requests. The bill would directly affect public entities, records custodians, requesters, school districts, county clerks and recorders, and members of the public seeking access to records.
The bill’s apparent reception was mixed and ultimately unfavorable in committee, as reflected by its postponement indefinitely in the Senate Committee on State, Veterans, & Military Affairs. The proposal contains several transparency-oriented provisions, such as website posting requirements and fee breakdown disclosures, but it also imposes longer response periods and new grounds for delay and fee recovery. The absence of recorded votes or transcripts limits the ability to identify specific supporters or opponents, but the committee outcome suggests at least some concern about the bill’s balance between access and administrative burden.
The main points of contention appear to be the tradeoff between public access and administrative flexibility. Supporters would likely emphasize clearer posting requirements, student privacy protections, payment modernization, and more detailed fee disclosures, while opponents may object to the longer five-day response period, expanded extension authority, the ability to classify some requests as commercial solicitations for pecuniary gain, and the added fee and delay mechanisms. Public records advocates may also be concerned that the new delay provisions and fee rules could make CORA requests slower or more expensive, while public entities may view the bill as providing needed tools to manage workload and abusive or repetitive requests.