NY Bill Would Require Online State Records

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "Micah Kellner, the New York State assemblyman who last year submitted a bill to provide a tax credit to open source developers, has now proposed the 'Open New York Act,' a law that would make it mandatory for state agencies to put almost all of their public records on the Internet. According to Kellner's office, the law would 'revolutionize the relationship between New Yorkers and their state government, requiring all state agencies to make their records available through a central website — where the data can be used by activists, entrepreneurs, and others to create a host of applications useful in everyday life.' The Open Government Foundation, Citizens Union, and New York Public Interest Research Group all support the bill."

Comments

Oh my, the possibilities for disaster

[phrackwulf]

Boggle the mind. I guess it didn't occur to the people involved that just as many bad things can be done with this data as good things? I can see the headlines now. Don't like African Americans? I'll load up the "Negro avoider" app on my computer. And never have my commute disrupted again by the sight of people I don't like. Or what about the "victim finder" app for child molesters? Just take the data on family occupancies and compare to local crime statistics and police coverage and voila! Thanks Victim Finder! I hope I'm just crazy but this seems like a triumph of enthusiasm over common sense at first glance.

Re:Oh my, the possibilities for disaster

[Trepidity]

You can already get much of that data pretty easily from the federal government, e.g. your hypothetical racial map for Chicago.

I do think there are probably bad things one can do with demographic data as opposed to good ones, but I'm not sure you can do much by simply hiding the data. De-facto racial segregation in housing exists long after the eradication of de-jure segregation, and even if you hid the data, people who live in a city are going to notice that neighborhoods have different demographics, and if they were going to avoid neighborhoods with races they don't like, they can (and do) already do it without the app.

Re:Oh my, the possibilities for disaster

[Brett Buck]

Don't like African Americans? I'll load up the "Negro avoider" app on my computer. And never have my commute disrupted again by the sight of people I don't like.

          I think that falls into "stupidity is its own reward" category.

        Brett

Re:Oh my, the possibilities for disaster

[Score Whore]

All of that data is already publicly available - you just have to drive down to the individual offices.

Which is a fine situation to be in. The vast majority of people won't have any use for this data being online. So why spend millions of dollars to benefit a very small percentage of the population. I would hope that they could find something better to do with the tax dollars they collect. Hell, if they've got extra cash burning a hole in their pocket, perhaps they could just take less from us next year?

Re:Oh my, the possibilities for disaster

[NewYorkCountryLawyer]

All of that data had been available to large corporations who track that sort of thing.
All of that data is already publicly available - you just have to drive down to the individual offices.

Will it cause problems? I don't know.

Will it make government more transparent? I think so.

Well said. This is all publicly available stuff that would be available under the Freedom of Information Law. It just means that getting the stuff will be less dependent on (a) having money to spend and (b) having money for lawyers. I.e., it makes the process more democratic.

Re:Oh my, the possibilities for disaster

[NewYorkCountryLawyer]

The vast majority of people won't have any use for this data being online.

Not so. Just because most people don't have a direct need for the material, and wouldn't know what to do with it if they had it, doesn't mean that society doesn't need it. Society does need it. It's just like securities prospectuses; most small investors don't read them, but the fact that the prospectuses are out there and publicly accessible is extremely important to every investor: (1) it helps to keep people honest, and (2) the pros who can read and understand them spread the information to the rest of us.

Re:Oh my, the possibilities for disaster

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Or what about the "victim finder" app for child molesters? Just take the data on family occupancies and compare to local crime statistics and police coverage and voila! Thanks Victim Finder!

This may be the most absurd "think of the chiiildren" argument I've ever heard ... and that's saying something.

First of all, the vast majority of molestation victims are attacked by family members, who don't exactly need demographic information to find their targets. Second, even in the very rare case of stranger-abduction attacks, do you really think they're going after children at home? Take a walk outside -- there's a good chance there's an elementary school within a few blocks of where you live.

As for your hypothetical "Negro avoider" bigot ... well, let him do what he wants. There are already lots of people who won't drive through "that part of town" where "those people live." As long as they're not burning crosses on people's lawns, who gives a damn?

Re:Oh my, the possibilities for disaster

[Daniel Dvorkin]

So why spend millions of dollars to benefit a very small percentage of the population.

Almost everything the government does benefits a very small percentage of the population, at any one time. But you add all those small percentages up, and you get nearly everybody.

Re:Oh my, the possibilities for disaster

[zippthorne]

Indeed. For instance, the plans for the bypass scheduled to go through your property (for which, demolition begins tomorrow) are stored in a disused lavatory in the basement of the library, behind a sign with the text, "beware of the leopard." If that's not public enough for anybody, I don't know what is.

well, why not?

[girlintraining]

We fund so-called 'sustainable energy' projects and other such things that aren't economically viable without government funding. Why not software too? And the return on investment is a lot better than a pile of wind mills, and no zoning laws or environmental impact studies to worry about.

Re:well, why not?

[AnonymousClown]

We fund so-called 'sustainable energy' projects and other such things that aren't economically viable without government funding.

You do realize that the oil industry has quite a few tax subsidies also, don't you? They've been getting them for years.

And the proposed plan is to grant public access to the data. Have you ever gone down to a government office and tried to get information on anything? A government clerk does the search. Sometimes, when they say they don't find anything, you just have to wonder how hard did they look. Especially some of those old crones that have been there for decades and short of going on a shooting spree, have absolutely no worry of being fired.

Re:well, why not?

[girlintraining]

Have you ever gone down to a government office and tried to get information on anything? A government clerk does the search.

Yes, actually. Unless it's a pending court case, I don't have to speak to anyone. But the docket listings for each week are routinely published online, so if you want to be completely thorough, there you go. In my state (Minnesota) every public record since 1973 is searchable by going to the courthouse in Minneapolis and using one of two computer terminals that are free to the public. Before that, records are stored on microfische(sp?) and date back to the mid-1800s. there is a small fee to pull the relevant records. Be aware... Searching for anything on those antiquidated systems takes hours. They only charge for copies made either by computer or MF. That same database is available for a fee to private investigators and other people who have a bona fide reason to access public records regularily, and those fees support its maintenance.

New York, frankly, is a bit behind the times.

Re:well, why not?

[Bigjeff5]

You do realize that the oil industry [reuters.com] has quite a few tax subsidies [rff.org] also, don't you? They've been getting them for years.

Sorry, but $2-36 billion in subsidies for the entire oil industry (from both links, the first I'm pretty sure is extremely inflated given the fact that even Greenpeace gives $35 billion as their highest estimate) doesn't seem that significant, considering Exxon alone paid $30 billion in taxes in 2007. Also, the oil industry pays a 4-5% higher tax rate than the rest of the market, so a 1-2% break doesn't seem all that bad, considering they already pay more than everybody else.

Add to that state and local taxes and you're looking at half of all revenues from the oil industry going to either a state or federal government.

If you bring the taxes more in line with the rest of the market and drop the subsidies, the oil industry is definitely economically viable. Do the same with nuclear, solar, or wind and the same is not true.

Anyway, back on topic, I'm all for putting public records online. Public records should be public, and since we have the technology to make public records easily accessible, we should do so.

If making a particular type of public record easily accessible causes significant harm, then we should be debating whether or not such records should be public in the first place, not whether or not they should be easily accessible.

Re:well, why not?

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Sorry, but $2-36 billion in subsidies for the entire oil industry (from both links, the first I'm pretty sure is extremely inflated given the fact that even Greenpeace gives $35 billion as their highest estimate) doesn't seem that significant, considering Exxon alone paid $30 billion in taxes in 2007.

I don't know about that, but in 2009, Exxon paid $0 in US income taxes, and Chevron only paid $200M.

Some more background

[oldhack]

Who's this crazy loon? I wanna send some campaign donation.

Well ...

[PPH]

... a detailed accounting of Spitzer's expenditures would have been interesting reading.

Re:NYS Government Worker here

[NewYorkCountryLawyer]

No matter how jaded you think you are, you would be shocked by the degree of decision making that is carried out by appointed bureaucrats in protected sinecures. Decisions that affect the daily lives of hundreds of thousands or millions of people are done completely by fiat with no political accountability whatsoever. The more that this is exposed, the better for everyone.

That is why I think the cost argument against it is poorly taken. Because I think with greater accountability and transparency, there would be a major net gain, as less money would be expended on wasteful and purposeless things which are solely the result of political dealmaking, not genuine governance. Most bloggers and online journalists have no meaningful access to the records of these things; once these records were online, and the "blogosphere" could get its mitts on this stuff, the results will be hilarious. And ultimately beneficial.

Re:It's a Bad Idea

[daemonenwind]

Prevalence of cell phone ownership.
Understanding of property ownership.
Unlisted numbers.
Non-automated nature of phone records.
Limited name information in phone records. (A B Smith? Really?)

Getting government, online records faces none of these data quality issues.