Ohio gives local law enforcement the ability to charge up to $750 for public video footage

Gov. Mike DeWine defended the measure as a "workable compromise." Also, for paid subscribers: Closing my tabs.

Jan 05, 2025

∙ Paid

Language from H.B. 315; Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signs legislation (inset).

This past week, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed a bill into law that could enable law enforcement to charge up to $750 for a member of the public, including the media, to obtain bodycam footage of a deadly police encounter or video of a jail death.

Although the Republican governor used his line-item veto power to cut other provisions from the bill — and was urged to do so to cut this provision as well — he instead issued a separate statement explicitly expressing his support for this anti-transparency measure.

The provision asserts that “a state or local law enforcement agency may charge a requester the actual cost associated with preparing a video record for inspection or production, not to exceed seventy-five dollars per hour of video produced, nor seven hundred fifty dollars total.”

Here is the provision in H.B. 315, underlined, that is being added to the state’s public records law:

(B)(1) Upon request by any person and subject to division (B)(8) of this section, all public records responsive to the request shall be promptly prepared and made available for inspection to the requester at all reasonable times during regular business hours. Subject to division (B)(8) of this section, upon request by any person, a public office or person responsible for public records shall make copies of the requested public record available to the requester at cost and within a reasonable period of time. When considering whether a state or local law enforcement agency promptly prepared a video record for inspection or provided a video record for production within a reasonable period of time, in addition to any other factors, a court shall consider the time required for a state or local law enforcement agency to retrieve, download, review, redact, seek legal advice regarding, and produce the video record. Notwithstanding any other requirement set forth in Chapter 149. of the Revised

Code, a state or local law enforcement agency may charge a requester the actual cost associated with preparing a video record for inspection or production, not to exceed seventy-five dollars per hour of video produced, nor seven hundred fifty dollars total. As used in this division, "actual cost," with respect to video records only, means all costs incurred by the state or local law enforcement agency in reviewing, blurring or otherwise obscuring, redacting, uploading, or producing the video records, including but not limited to the storage medium on which the record is produced, staff time, and any other relevant overhead necessary to comply with the request. A state or local law enforcement agency may include in its public records policy the requirement that a requester pay the estimated actual cost before beginning the process of preparing a video record for inspection or production. Where a state or local law enforcement agency imposes such a requirement, its obligation to produce a video or make it available for inspection begins once the estimated actual cost is paid in full by the requester. A state or local law enforcement agency shall provide the requester with the estimated actual cost within five business days of receipt of the public records request. If the actual cost exceeds the estimated actual cost, a state or local law enforcement agency may charge a requester for the difference upon fulfilling a request for video records if the requester is notified in advance that the actual cost may be up to twenty per cent higher than the estimated actual cost. A state or local law enforcement agency shall not charge a requester a difference that exceeds twenty per cent of the estimated actual cost.

Although his statement accompanying the bill asserted that he “strongly support[s] the public’s — and the news media’s — right to access public records,” and claimed that the provision “doesn’t change that right,” DeWine also has been in government for most of the past 50 years and knows what the possibility of a $750 charge would do to many public records requests.

He then justified his support for the restriction on the public’s ability to access bodycam and and dashcam footage as a “changing technology” issue:

Law enforcement-worn body cameras and dashboard cameras have been a major improvement for both law enforcement investigations and for accountability. However, I am sensitive to the fact that this changing technology has affected law enforcement by often times creating unfunded burdens on these agencies, especially when it comes to the often time consuming and labor-intensive work it takes to provide them as public records.
"No law enforcement agency should ever have to choose between diverting resources for officers on the street to move them to administrative tasks like lengthy video redaction reviews for which agencies receive no compensation–and this is especially so for when the requestor of the video is a private company seeking to make money off of these videos. The language in House Bill 315 is a workable compromise to balance the modern realities of preparing these public records and the cost it takes to prepare them. Ohio law has long authorized optional user fees associated with the cost of duplicating public records, and the language in House Bill 315 applies that concept in a modern way to law enforcement-provided video records.

The problem with DeWine’s analysis is that any commercial ventures are the very ones least likely to have their access eliminated by a fee. Local media, on the other hand, let alone independent journalists or local activists, are the most likely to be effectively shut out by viewing such a cost as prohibitive.

If the effectiveness of the public records law is being stymied because of concerns of about “a private company seeking to make money off of these videos,” that — not the access of such videos to the public and for newsgathering operations — is what should be addressed.

Then, DeWine added three claims that are supposed to look like caveats to his support, but, in reality, they just serve as addition evidence of how bad this provision is.

"It is good that the language in House Bill 315 does not include a mandatory fee, but instead it is optional at the discretion of the agency.” This suggests that this is a soft bill, with exceptions, but what this actually means is that the worst agencies, least interested in public accountability, are able to take the harshest steps.

“It is also good the user fees are capped and directly related to the cost of production.” This just means it could have been worse. There didn’t need to be a cap, DeWine said, and it could have just been an outright fee.

"If the language in House Bill 315 related to public records turns out to have unforeseen consequences, I will work with the General Assembly to amend the language to address such legitimate concerns." This would be good to know, but, are the “consequences” really “unforeseen” to a man first elected to office in 1976?

More broadly, this argument turns good government on its head. DeWine is asserting that state government should enable local law enforcement to make it more difficult for the public it is supposed to be serving to observe its actions and hold it accountable as a first principle and then, if the public is somehow able to convince lawmakers that that this is causing harm, they will consider changes.

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