johnhawkinson
commented
4 years ago Well. Let's start with what I actually said:
Remove policy restrictions on fee waivers (esp. for media), and on non-transferrability of the data obtained.
The Electronic Public Access Fee Schedule (https://www.uscourts.gov/services-forms/fees/electronic-public-access-fee-schedule) has long strongarmed Courts into denying fee waivers to journalists, e.g. §9 (bullet 1: "a court should not exempt…members of the media") and also tries to prevent waiver recipients from sharing data they've received (bullet 3: "must not transfer any data obtained…unless expressly authorized"). This doesn't have the force of law, but most courts follow the policy guidance. But there are plenty of cases where media waivers for cases make sense; the courts should be allowed to figure that out themselve without a finger on the scales. (I have, despite being media, personally obtained a fee waiver for purposes of accessing the thousands of documents in a single case of interest so I could full-text search them; but the policy language discourages even trying.)
so we get to Mike's comment:
This ban flies in the face of the purpose of PACER, and has no other purpose except to protect the revenue stream.
Well, that's not true. The ban serves to discourage fee waiver requests from a large category of users, and it seems clear that if either of those restrictions were removed (members of the media; non-transferrability) were removed, there would likely be more fee waiver requests. Perhaps substantially more.
The burden of adjudication of fee waiver requests goes to the administration of justice. In my district, they are an administrative burden since they are docketed as miscellaneous cases by the clerk's office, they are assigned to the Chief Judge (who has a lot of stuff to do), and there is a recommendation from the Clerk to the Chief Judge.
So, two questions you might ask are (1) whether it is appropriate to consider the administrative costs of the change, and (2) if you do, whether the burden to the courts is worth the additional transparency interests.
One counter is the AOUSC's multi-district form has likely dramatically increased the number of requests adjudicated per court, so therefore the burden can't be too high.
mlissner
Describe the solution you'd like This ban flies in the face of the purpose of PACER, and has no other purpose except to protect the revenue stream. Eliminate the ban so that PACER's mission is better achieved.
Additional context https://twitter.com/johnhawkinson/status/1232989452357840896
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