How the Legislature has exempted itself from the Public Records Act.
This recent Olympia editorial highlights the fact that Legislators’ emails are not subject to the Public Records Act.
But there is no simple “legislative exemption” in the PRA. Instead, you have to look at two statutes.
It starts with the definition of “public record” in RCW 42.56.010(2). That definition provides that “public records means legislative records as defined in RCW 40.14.100.”
The definition of “legislative record” in RCW 40.14.100 then expressly excludes “reports or correspondence made or received by or in any way under the personal control of the individual members of the legislature.” In other words, records held by individual legislators, including their emails, are not “legislative records” and thus not “public records.”
