NEWS
Wednesday, March 20, 2019
herMIsTOnheraLd.cOM • A9
Wide variety of records available to the public
By JADE MCDOWELL
NEWS EDITOR
P
ublic records are a
powerful tool for
investigative journal-
ists, but they’re available to
anyone.
“In the spirit of Oregon
law, what we do is open
to the public,” Pendleton
city recorder Andrea Den-
ton said. “Our meetings
are open to the public, our
records are open to the pub-
lic, everything we do is in
the public eye.”
Public records include
police reports, meeting min-
utes, contracts, salaries,
budgets, emails, ordinances,
schedules, deeds, maps and
a long list of other records.
In fact, Denton said, Oregon
law considers everything
generated by a government
agency public record unless
a bill is passed specifically
exempting it from access.
The internet has made
access easier than ever.
People can always submit
an official public records
request, but these days Den-
ton said most of Pendleton’s
records are searchable for
free online — no paperwork
required.
Steve Churchill, public
records officer for Umatilla
County, said his office most
often helps people find cop-
ies of marriage records and
property deeds. Some peo-
ple choose to drop by and
search through old records
themselves, while the office
also fields 10 to 20 email
requests per day. Churchill
said most requests are filled
the same day.
While newer records are
available in digital form,
the county also has a large
archive on paper.
“We have deeds going
back to 1862, and there are
several hundred thousand,”
he said.
Churchill said it can be
time-consuming to locate
a record when people say
staff photo by e.J. harris
Old bound books filled with the county courts dockets sit on a shelf in the basement of the Umatilla County Courthouse along
with other county documents.
staff photo by e.J. harris
Rows of Oregon state court records are stored in a storage room in the basement of the
Umatilla County Courthouse in Pendleton.
they’re looking for some-
thing that they know exists
sometime in a 30-year
timespan.
“The more you know, the
better,” he said. “Dates are
important because we have
records going back so far.”
About 7.6 percent of
public records requests
come from professional
journalists, according to
the Columbia Journalism
Review. Churchill said title
company employees, peo-
ple in the real estate busi-
ness and companies looking
to locate in the area fre-
quently use land use records
in their work. Other people
are looking for their fam-
ily’s history or their own
records.
One record people often
request from the county
is birth records, but Chur-
chill said those are actu-
ally maintained at the state
level and must be requested
through the Oregon Health
Authority.
Lilly
Alarcon-Strong,
city recorder for Hermiston,
said most requests for city
records in Hermiston can
be submitted through her,
but the police department
and municipal courts handle
requests for their own doc-
uments. A public records
request form can be found
online at hermiston.or.us/
public-records or in person
at city hall.
She said some people are
habitual records requesters.
American Transparency, a
national nonprofit dedicated
to track government spend-
ing, has a regular sched-
ule of records requests for
all of the city’s purchasing
contracts and other financial
information. They add that
information to their search-
able database at www.open-
thebooks.com.
The Hermiston Her-
ald frequently uses public
records, including budgets
and memos to city coun-
cilors, in its reporting on
Hermiston and other city
governments.
Alarcon-Strong
said
Hermiston is working to
digitize its older public
records using the Oregon
Records Management Solu-
tion provided by the state,
which will not only allow
people to access records
from their home for free, but
will also make them search-
able by keywords.
Plenty of more current
public records, from record-
ings of city council meet-
ings to building permits,
are already available online.
While people often tout the
idea of needing transpar-
ency in government, Alar-
con-Strong said most peo-
ple don’t take advantage of
what is already there.
When the city voted to
increase water and sewer
rates starting March 1, for
example, the council dis-
cussed it in open meet-
ings, there were several
newspaper articles about it,
the city posted about it to
social media and put notices
in everyone’s water bill.
Despite those efforts, there
are still people “who come
in and they have no idea.”
“There is just so much
stuff people want to know,
but they have to make the
effort to get the informa-
tion,” she said. “... There is
only so much we can do to
push the word out.”
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