Pennsylvania Right-to-Know Law

CHESTER COUNTY, Penn. – The growing use of chat apps like Google Chat by school districts across the U.S. is raising concerns about transparency and public access to government meetings and records.  First reported by the Delaware Valley Journal, concern is rapidly emerging in Pennsylvania as school districts, including the…

Attorneys for the Brechner Center and a coalition of open-government groups are urging Pennsylvania’s highest court to reaffirm that journalists are entitled to view video from school surveillance cameras that capture newsworthy information. A brief filed Wednesday with the Pennsylvania Supreme Court argues that footage from security cameras cannot be…

A surveillance video that captured an altercation between a high-school student and an adult volunteer is a public record that must be turned over to journalists, a Pennsylvania appeals court ruled Monday, turning aside the school district’s claim that federal privacy law required keeping the footage confidential. In a 3-0…

Newsworthy video from school surveillance cameras can’t be withheld from the public on the grounds of student privacy, a group of open-government groups argues in a brief filed with a Pennsylvania appeals court. The brief, authored by the Brechner Center’s Frank LoMonte and David Jadon, supports television journalists from Harrisburg who used their state’s Right-to-Know-Law to request footage of a school-bus security camera that captured an altercation between a parent and a student.