Now in compliance — Weston County adopts public records requests fee schedule
After discovering that the county was not complying with laws regarding public records requests, the Board of Weston County Commissioners adopted two resolutions over the past several months to rectify the oversight. The resolutions designated a county records person and established a fee schedule for public records requests.
On Feb. 18, Chairman Nathan Todd told the commissioners that after working through a recent public records request, he discovered that the resolution declaring a county records person was not up to date.
Adopted in 2019 — following a new law creating the requirement for the public records person — the resolution on file for the county established former Weston County Attorney Alex Berger as the county’s public records person. But a new county records person was not named after Berger was no longer the county’s attorney.
To rectify the issue, Todd presented a new resolution to the board that declared the Weston County attorney as the designated public records person. According to 16-4-202 this person’s name, business email address and business mailing address are to be submitted to the Wyoming Department of Administration and Information for publication on the Department of Administration’s official website.
The county’s resolution notes that department heads and elected officials — including the Weston County assessor, attorney, clerk of district court, coroner, county clerk, Homeland Security coordinator, sheriff and treasurer — “shall continue to make all decisions as to the release of their respective documents as the official custodians of their own respective records, but that the Weston County Attorney shall serve as the public records person for those elected officials and department heads, solely for the purpose of servicing as a point of contact between the elected officials/department heads offices and the applicant seeking the public records.”
On April 1, the commissioners then adopted another resolution relating to public records requests. Pursuant to Wyoming Statute 16-4-204, the county established a fee schedule for public records requests and established a process.
Fees established by the resolution are $1 per side for black and white photocopies and $2 for color copies; $1 per scanned page and $2 per side per page for facsimile service (both to transmit and receive).
For electronic record production, a flash drive must be purchased from the Weston County Clerk’s office at a cost of $10 for 4G, $15 for 32G and $20 for 64G. Other electronic mediums must ask for an actual cost.
Postage for documents that must be mailed will be charged the actual charges incurred by the county to fill the request.
As for staff fees, the county set the price at $20 per hour that begins to accumulate after the first 15 minutes required to produce the record, despite some concerns from Bob Bonnar, publisher and editor in chief of the News Letter Journal.
In a letter to the board, Bonnar asked for the board to consider expanding that time to two hours. He did state that he agreed with the $20 per hour assessment.
During their discussion, however, the commissioners agreed that 15 minutes was enough time to provide before charging a fee for retrieval of records. They mentioned several reasons for imposing charges on members of the public for records that take longer than 15 minutes to produce, noting that employees are being taken from other tasks and indicating a belief that most record requests should be able to be filled in a short time. Commissioner Vera Huber stated that she could see a two-hour grace period being abused by the public, and expressed that public records requests are essentially creating another job for public officials to perform.
Todd acknowledged the length of time some requests can take to fulfill, and noted that even answering questions from the newspaper takes time away from performing other duties.
Commissioner Marty Ertman said that the amount of time it takes to fill a request, and whether or not the individual is charged for that, should be at the discretion of the custodian of the record. She noted it can be hard to quantify the actual time spent on the request when the custodian may get pulled away for various reasons.
In addition to the fees, the resolution established other guidelines for public records requests.
According to the resolution, all requests will be submitted in writing. If the request is not done so in writing, the “public records custodian may demand the same in written form.”
It additionally establishes a timeline of seven days for the county attorney to inform the requester if the requested information is in the custody of Weston County, if access to the records is being denied and why or if any information requested is in active use at the time and therefore unavailable.
All records “properly requested” shall be released no later than 30 days after the request is acknowledged, unless a lawful basis for denial is established. This is also the timeline established by Wyoming Statute.
Commission clips
Notes from the April 1, 2025, meeting of the Weston County Commissioners
The commissioners approved pre-authorization for the expenditure of $1,249 by the Weston County Sheriff’s Office to Adams Publishing Group for online advertising.
The board approved the collections of the Weston County Clerk, including a check from Vaultside for $20,643.67. The county has been in a dispute with Vaultside, the company that provides online records services for the county, over a contract and the payment of funds owed to the county.
The board approved a memorandum of understanding for the Buffalo Creek Road project with a cap of $250,000 to be spent out of county road funds.
The board signed a document stating that the county was in favor of the agreement between Chubb Insurance and Howard White Construction for repairs at Mallo camp.
The board tabled a memorandum of understanding with the Weston County Fair Board pending further discussion.
Kristi Lipp, community prevention specialist, provided an update on the 21 Wellness Coalition, including that the money for the entity is now funneled through Weston County School District No. 7. Lipp also proposed a plan to facilitate the expenditure of problem gambling funds that was approved by the board.
The board discussed the need for declarations on the disclosure of conflicts of interest for not only themselves but also for other elected officials and appointed board members.