I've written before (in connection to the journalists' shield law sponsored by Indiana U.S. Sen. Dick Lugar and Rep. Mike Pence) about the reluctance of some to welcome the citizen journalists of the Internet into the press community. Now it's a state issue, too. House Bill 1067, introduced by Rep. Bob Cherry, R-Greenfield, would close birth and death records, which are open to the public under current state law. Aside from setting up the obvious privacy vs. right-to-know conflict, the bill also would exempt certain groups from the tough-to-get-the-records requirements (i.e., obtaining a court order): relatives of the person listed on the record, someone researching genealogy, or "a member of the media."
And the definition of media raises a red flag for at least one person:
Such a law might be difficult to enforce, according to Marian Pearcy, president of the Indiana Coalition for Open Government, which advocates public access to government records. She opposes the legislation."I'm not clear as to why the press should get any special privileges over the citizen," Pearcy said. "In this day and age, with the Internet blogs, what is the media right now?"The bill would limit the definition of news media to newspapers that have been publishing for at least three consecutive years, licensed radio and television stations, and news services.
The issue came up because of one of those citizen journalists. In 1999, Greenfield lawyer Thomas Williams started placing information from Hancock County birth and death records on his local-interest Web site. Pam Baker, office manager of the Hancock County Health Department, initially denied Williams' request for the records but then complied after she discovered she could be charged with a felony for withholding the information. Last year, Baker contacted Rep. Cherry, R-Greenfield, who promised he would draft a bill to address her concerns.
We shouldn't make light of privacy issues and concerns over identify theft, but those debates exist apart from whether the information goes out to blogs or other Web sites or just to members of the "traditional media." If legislators don't even try to address advances in technology with their proposals, the law will be increasingly out of touch with the way the world actually works.
