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| New bill restricts access to some public records |
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| All military discharge papers are closed to the public because they contain personal information |
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By Jason Chaney
Following the passage of a new state law, access to public records at the Crook County Clerk's Office will be more restricted than ever before.
Senate Bill 618, which was signed into law last Wednesday, requires that all military discharge records be closed to the public.
"The military discharge papers contain personal information," said Oregon Governor's Office spokesperson Anna Richter Taylor. "They have social security information, health history and more - personal stuff. This is just a preventative measure to protect the identity of veterans."
While that was the intent, it has also created difficulties for the Crook County Clerk's Office as well as other clerk's offices throughout the state.
"All the military records were opened to the public," said Crook County Clerk Dee Berman. "Now they are closed and that presents a problem in 31 counties because we have our military discharge records co-mingled with deed and mortgage records."
Berman went on to explain that records have been co-mingled since 1983, when the clerk's office began storing records on microfilm rather than in bound books. When they were bound, each type of record was separately stored.
Since Berman began working as the county clerk in 1995, she was not around when the switch to microfilm was made and does not know why records are mixed together.
Nonetheless, the clerk's office now has to keep discharge records confidential, which means vault records have to be monitored closely. Citizens will no longer have access to the records vault as they have up until now.
"Before, we just let people walk in and we were proud of that," Berman said. "We're all kind of struggling with it. What we're faced with now is having to close the vault or having one of us in there with them."
In order to meet all the requests for records throughout the day, the clerk's office will close for a half-hour at the beginning of each workday (8 to 8:30 a.m.) and the end of the workday (4:30 to 5 p.m.).
To correct the co-mingling problem, the clerk's office will go through a $15,000 to $20,000 process of copying and reproducing records.
"We send each original copy in (to Helion, a software and programming company)," Berman explained. "Then they would copy that. Then they go in and digitize it and they would have to redact anything with a military discharge. Then they would make me another original film with that redaction and a working copy."
While she doesn't know exactly how many microfilm records have to be corrected, Berman estimates it at more than 1,000.
To help pay for the correcting process, the clerk's office will charge a recording fee for each record request made. The cost is based on search time starting at $3.75 for a zero-to-10-minute search and $25 for a 46-60 minute search.
Despite the expense, a legislative review of the bill determined that the new law would have no impact on local or state revenue.
"There isn't (an impact) if we just close our records," Berman said.
However, the goal is not to close their records, and eventually make the vault available to the public again. To do so requires the clerk's office to "figure some things out" regarding confidential information like military discharge records.
"I don't know how long that is down the road," Berman said. |
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