BY ELIZABETH THOMPSON
Nevada’s open records law says it exists in order “to foster democratic principles” and “must be construed liberally” and that “any exemption, exception or balancing of interests which limits or restricts access…must be construed narrowly.”
The law applies to “all public books and public records of a government entity, the contents of which are not otherwise declared by law to be confidential.” When a government body asserts that a public record is confidential, the burden of proof rests on it to demonstrate in what way and by what statue the record is confidential.
Records “must be open at all times during office hours to inspection by any person, and may be fully copied.” A person requesting a public record may not be asked to provide any identifying information, such as his/her name, address, whether he/she is a citizen or voter or taxpayer, why he/she wants to see the public record, or for what the public records will be used.
Public bodies may charge a fee for copying public records, however, “Such a fee must not exceed the actual cost to the governmental entity to provide the copy of the public record unless a specific statute or regulation sets a fee that the government entity must charge for the copy.”
A governmental entity may determine that a request for a copy of a public record would require “extraordinary use of its personnel or technological resources”; in such cases, the entity may “charge a fee for such extraordinary use,” but such charge “must be reasonable” (based on costs the public body “actually incurs”) and the requesting person must be notified in advance of such fees/costs.
