S 4050: Authorizes police agencies to charge fees for searching, copying, and mailing police agency generated records except for where the requesting party is a victim to or was charged with the crime related to such documents.

  
  STATE OF NEW YORK ________________________________________________________________________ 4050 2025-2026 Regular Sessions  IN SENATE January 31, 2025 ___________ Introduced by Sens. SKOUFIS, PARKER -- read twice and ordered printed, and when printed to be committed to the Committee on Finance AN ACT to amend the executive law, in relation to authorizing police agencies to include administrative costs in fees for copies of police agency records The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem- bly, do enact as follows: 1 Section 1. The executive law is amended by adding a new section 837-y 2 to read as follows: 3 § 837-y. Fees for copies of police agency records. 1. Fees generally. 4 Except as provided by law that no fee shall be charged, local police 5 agencies may charge a fee for searching the police agency records, copy- 6 ing the resulting documents, and preparing such documents for mailing as 7 provided in this section. Provided, however, that no fee shall be 8 charged to any public officer, board, body, agency, or department or 9 volunteer fire company, for searches or copies of documents to be used 10 for a public purpose. Provided further, however, that no fee shall be 11 charged to a victim of a crime, to an individual charged with a crime, 12 or such person's attorney where the searches or copies of documents are 13 related to the crime such person is a victim to or charged with. 14 2. Fees for searches of police agency records. (a) The fee for a 15 search which is made manually by the police agency shall be five dollars 16 per request. 17 (b) The fee for a search which is conducted by means of an electronic 18 medium shall be three dollars per request. 19 3. Fees for copies of documents and preparation for mailing. The fees 20 for copies of documents, other than accident reports, shall be one 21 dollar per page. A page shall consist of either a single or double-side 22 of any document. The fee for a copy of an accident report shall be 23 fifteen dollars. All copies of documents shall be certified at no addi- 24 tional fee. Whenever a search of records of the police agency is EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets [ ] is old law to be omitted. LBD07900-01-5 
 S. 4050 2 1 required in conjunction with a copy of a document, the fee shall be the 2 fee for the search as provided in subdivision two of this section. The 3 result of such search will be the locating of the document, or if no 4 document can be located, a certification to that effect will be the 5 result of such search. The fee for the preparation for mailing, if 6 necessary, shall be two dollars per request. 7 § 2. This act shall take effect on the sixtieth day after it shall 8 have become a law.