Advocacy
Public records and open meetings law changes most sessions, and clerks are the people who have to implement it. CAMRO testifies on implementation cost, not on policy.
2027 session · priority
The bill would bring text messages and disappearing-message applications explicitly under the Clearwater Public Records Act and the retention schedule.
CAMRO supports the clarity. Clerks have been asked for council members’ texts for years with no clean answer, and an explicit rule is better than an argued one.
CAMRO has told the committee what it will cost. No municipality in Clearwater currently has a way to capture a council member’s texts from a personal device. In a town with one full-time employee, compliance means either buying a capture product nobody has budgeted for or telling elected officials to stop using a tool they already use. The bill as drafted funds neither.
Would allow the 48-hour Chapter 38 notice to be satisfied by posting to a municipal website alone, without a physical posting. CAMRO is neutral and has asked for a transition period; roughly a fifth of Clearwater municipalities do not maintain a site they control.
Would set a statewide maximum for copy fees under Chapter 42. CAMRO supports it. The current position, where every municipality sets its own, produces requester complaints that land on the clerk rather than on whoever set the fee.
The Legislative Committee brings a position to the Board, and the Board adopts it. Positions are limited to the administrative and cost consequences of a bill for municipal clerks. CAMRO does not take a position on whether a record should be public — that is a policy question for the legislature and taking sides on it would cost us the standing that makes the implementation testimony useful.
If a bill affects your work and is not listed here, tell your district director. Most of what the committee tracks arrived that way.
Members meet legislators before the session opens. It is the single most useful thing a member can attend if implementation cost is landing on your desk.