Ombudsman says she lacks ‘teeth’ in enforcing public records requests

Editor's note: This story has been updated. 

CHEYENNE — Wyoming Public Records Ombudsman Darlena Potter said she has “no teeth” when asking government entities to fulfill public records requests.

During the Legislature’s Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Committee meeting in Lander on Friday, lawmakers reviewed the state’s Public Records and Public Meetings acts and heard testimony from Potter to understand the climate of public records requests in Wyoming.

The state’s ombudsman serves as the mediator between governmental agencies and the public over disputes regarding timely public records requests. In her position, which was created in 2019 by the Wyoming Legislature, Potter receives complaints when an agency does not meet the 30-day response deadline and fails to release the requested documents.

The ombudsman must determine whether that agency had “good cause.”

When handling disputes, the ombudsman may prescribe a new timeline for releasing the records, as well as waive associated fees. But her power is limited beyond that. 

“We created this position for not necessarily the state, but for all of the entities, the smaller boards and commissions, the small municipalities,” said co-Chairman Sen. Cale Case, R-Lander. “We thought this would be helpful to them, as well as to the person making the records requests.”

Potter said staffing is a common issue in a government entity’s ability to fulfill a records request in a timely manner. For example, if a person asked the county clerk for a public record, it’s not ideal to make the request during election season.

Wyoming law allows a person to file a civil lawsuit in district court against an entity they find to be in violation of the Public Records Act. Potter’s job is to mediate conflicts before they reach that point.

“You know, court’s expensive,” Potter said. “Whatever we can do to help the citizens get what they’re entitled to is really what we should do — at the least amount of cost that we can.”

She told the committee she’s handled 27 cases since the start of the year, with five involving repeat clients, and only six cases remain in the mediation process.

Uniform fees

Another issue Potter’s run into is the lack of consistency in fees for public records requests.

“Everyone in the state of Wyoming is kind of working off their own fee schedules, so to speak, with regard to what can be charged for those records,” Potter said.

Rep. Pepper Ottman, R-Riverton, who testified during public comment, since she’s not a member of the committee, suggested putting in a statutory framework to unify public records request processes across the state at the local level.

Former Rep. Sarah Penn, R-Fort Washakie, echoed Ottman’s remarks, adding that this issue is “near and dear to my heart.”

“We see investigations across the state where one entity charges nothing and another entity charges $45 or $60 or one school board charges $900 and another one charges $1,800 for the same request of information,” Ellis said. “We need to ensure that we are examining some way to make sure that there’s a standardization.”

Wyoming does not have a fee schedule for public records requests. Fees vary by local entity across the state and reflect costs for printing and staff time.

Rep. Mike Yin, D-Jackson, asked Potter for her thoughts on asking agencies to justify high costs of fees after a certain threshold.

“For fees where the request is over $1,000 … the agency (should) justify why it’s $1,000,” Yin said. “When we have these really exorbitant fees, if there are good reasons, I think those should be outlined.”

Potter suggested establishing a fee threshold, similar to that created by the Wyoming Department of Administration and Information for state entities. The department will cover the first $180 and then will give an estimate of costs beyond that, she said.

“I would ultimately like to see most fee schedules include some at least nominal fee that would allow the citizens to receive something that’s readily available for free,” Potter said. “I know that they have limited means and they have costs to cover, but if it’s just something very small and reasonable … I think the public is entitled.”

Burden is on the public 

Newcastle News Letter Journal Publisher and Editor- in-Chief Bob Bonnar told lawmakers that the burden to obtain public records rests largely on the public. Bonnar gave several anecdotes to support his testimony from the perspective of the press, and sent a 50-page email of examples from news stories around the state to each committee member.

Bonnar said his newspaper recently sued Weston County after three county commissioners voted by secret ballot to nominate a representative. The lawsuit didn’t cost the county a dime, since it was represented by another county attorney pro bono, he said.

However, it cost the newspaper $15,000. 

“We were forced to sue them to get them to acknowledge that the secret ballot was illegal,” Bonnar said.

Bonnar said governmental entities can “hide behind” the ombudsman, since the burden lies on the public to file their complaints.

“Governments can just tell us no,” Bonnar said. “The ombudsman then becomes an additional piece of bureaucracy that the public has to work through.”

Data mining

One issue brought up during the meeting was “data mining,” or the act of massive public records requests, usually by out-of-state entities, to collect and resell data, according to public testimony.

Cheyenne Mayor Patrick Collins said his city clerk gave him six examples of data mining challenges that she’s currently facing. Ohm Analytics sends the capital city a monthly request for every building permit on solar.

“They give us like 15 items they want,” Collins said. “They want the permit, the number, the name of everything on those permits.”

A.I. Solutions also recently sent a request for every purchasing record from July 1, 2020, through today, Collins said. The detailed request includes the I.D. number of the vendor, name of the vendor, P.O. number, the invoice, the check number and the purchase date.

Collins said he understood the responsibility and need to fulfill public records requests, but his question for the committee is “Who is that for?”

“If some company in New York wants to get this information so they can use it to sell products, and it’s going to take my clerk two or three hours a month to do that information, is that fair?” Collins asked.

Drafted legislation

Case made a successful motion to draft a bill for the committee’s next meeting. The bill would include several components to address the main concerns discussed Friday.

This includes a three-day timeline for an entity to acknowledge a request and a 10-day timeline to fulfill the request. If the entity needs longer than 10 days, it would need to go through the ombudsman to request a longer timeframe, with a potential maximum of the state’s current 30-day deadline.

The draft bill will also apply A& I’s fee schedule for state entities to local entities for public records requests and maintain the ombudsman’s ability to waive fees during a dispute. If an entity needs to charge a higher fee, it would have to go through the ombudsman to do so.

Finally, in response to the “lack of teeth” concern, it would give the ombudsman authority to levy civil penalties against an entity found to be out of compliance with the Public Records Act.

This story was published on May 10, 2025.