Illinois Governor Pat Quinn recently signed into law HB1716<\/a>. which allows public agencies to charge\u00a0people for the cost of record retrieval if the records\u00a0are stored off site, and allows time delays in responding to \u201cfrequent requesters\u201d of records using the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). A \u201cfrequent requester\u201d is defined in the bill as anyone who has requested more than 50 documents in a year, or 15 in a 30-day period. The bill does mention exemptions for members of \u201cthe new media\u201d and traditional media. The bill was justified as a cost saving measure that would also allow the general public to have easier access to records, since those \u201cfrequent requesters\u201d will be less likely to tie up resources with the passage of this bill.<\/p>\n Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan initially opposed<\/a> the bill, but has changed her stance and now supports it. The bill came about after a former police chief of Alsip, IL made 90 record requests in a single day. This was described as harassment, using the FOIA law as a tool to do damage rather than its original purpose of shining light on those in power.<\/p>\n Madigan described the former process of agencies contacting her office for permission to delay FOIA requests as problematic. Some agencies are alleged to have used the procedure as a method of \u201cstopping the clock\u201d on FOIA requests that they simply did not want to deliver on. An additional problem the AG\u2019s office expects this bill to solve is the large backlog of requests caused by so many agencies requesting delays in fulfilling FOIA requests.<\/p>\n