Governor Hochul vetoed a measure to speed up New York’s public records process, which is among the slowest in the nation. We asked our reporters about their most protracted records requests.
When Kathy Hochul took over as governor in 2021, she promised a more transparent, more responsive state government. In her first major speech as chief executive, she vowed to usher in a “new era of transparency,” including by facilitating an “expedited process” to more promptly fulfill public records requests under the state’s Freedom of Information Law.
It was a niche topic for a debut speech, but important for government accountability: FOIL, which allows members of the public to request unpublished records from state and local government agencies, is one the main ways that journalists, advocates, and other watchdogs ensure that New York officials don’t evade public scrutiny. Each state has a version of the law, but New York is among the slowest to fulfill requests.
Four years later, Hochul has pursued some transparency initiatives, — but still hasn’t come through on her promise to expedite New York’s notoriously slow FOIL system. This year, the state legislature tried to pick up the slack, passing a bill that would tighten the deadlines that agencies must meet in responding to FOIL requests — but this month, Hochul vetoed it.