Articles Tagged with public records

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How did we answer that? Public Records and Finding a Will

We received a public records request through the County’s online public records portal. The question was whether the County had a relative’s will. There are two questions here: what is a public records request for, and how can I find a relative’s will.

A public records request is any attempt to get access to a record of a government or public entity. In Oregon, state law provides a broad right of access to records generated by or for public entities. The Attorney General has a Public Records and Meetings Law Manual. That explains Oregon’s laws in greater detail. Many public entities have a portal where you can submit a public records request. If not, you should be able to contact the entity. Some records may already be easily available. For example, city or county codes or ordinances, or public meeting minutes, may already be on the organization’s website.

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Librarians may now qualify for FOIA fee exemption as educational institution requesters:

Excerpt from Wisblawg, 12/21/2020, blog post:

“Librarians now qualify for FOIA fee exemption as educational institution requesters,” December 21, 2020

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One of my favorite Robert Mankoff (New Yorker) cartoons has this caption (and you can search the Cartoon Bank for a copy): “One question: If this is the Information Age, how come nobody knows anything?”

Few non-librarians know about the hundreds (thousands, probably) of hidden document treasure troves, which go by many names: libraries, archives, repositories, databases, among others.

You’ve probably heard about Gutenberg and maybe even HathiTrust, but what about SCRIBD, SCETI, Feedbooks, BASE, Unglueit, and many, many, MANY more, including our intrepid public records warriers, at Public Resource and PlainSite.

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Oregon State Police, Public Records Unit, Criminal History Record Checks

Warning: Be careful if you use a search engine to locate the Oregon criminal record check site, rather than drilling down from the most recent OSP homepage. Old versions of the page and instructions are still showing up in Google and other web browser searches.  Make sure you are looking at the most recent instructions. As of today, instructions were dated February 2015.

Disclaimer: It is against state law for library staff members to engage in any conduct that might constitute the unauthorized practice of law (ORS 9.160, 9.166 and 9.21). They may not interpret statutes, cases or regulations, perform legal research, recommend or assist in the preparation of forms, or advise patrons regarding their legal rights. They may, however, assist patrons in locating materials or links that would aid in individual research.

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If you’ve not been following the news about the University of Oregon archives “leak,” now is the time to start catching up.

“Library workers under scrutiny for leak of 22,000 UO documents: Meanwhile, documents leaked to a professor were not returned by the UO’s deadline,” by Diane Dietz, The Register-Guard, Jan. 23, 2015

The Oregonian and the Register Guard have been posting stories. So has U of O blogger, Professor Harbaugh, at his UO Matters: The Unofficial Organ of the University of Oregon blog, which has links to the news stories.

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The  Oregon Attorney General’s 2014 Public Records and Meetings Manual is available for viewing and purchase.  (The last edition was published in 2011.)

Please visit the ODOJ website for information on downloading and ordering options.

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I missed PI Buzz while it was on hiatus and am glad to see Tamara is back in the blogging saddle, but maybe not on a punishing schedule that keeps her from blogging. Her posts are useful and educational and even if she posted just once a month many of us would be grateful.

PI Buzz

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