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Sponsor seeks study committee to inventory machine-readable government data
Summary
Representative Corcoran proposed HB 598 to create a study commission to inventory existing agency data and identify low-cost, machine-readable datasets agencies could publish. Committee members discussed scope, confidentiality protections and membership; an amendment to extend reporting and remove senate slots was discussed but not finalized.
Representative Corcoran told the committee House Bill 598 would create a bipartisan study commission to identify existing government data that can be published in machine-readable formats at low cost, and to recommend a set of initial metrics for regular publication.
Corcoran framed the bill as a pragmatic effort to expose low-cost, already-collected data such as police NIBRS submissions, Department of Education statistics and agency KPIs so citizens and policymakers can query performance trends more easily. "There are all sorts of data that are already in the system and this is the low hanging fruit," he said.
Committee members asked about scope and confidentiality. Corcoran said the commission's initial task would be to catalog existing agency reports and formats and that personally identifiable information would remain protected: "PII or personally identifiable information should absolutely continue to be restricted, and nothing either in this bill or in downstream bills would ever seek to weaken those protections," he told the committee.
Several members expressed support for a bipartisan membership structure and an amendment was discussed that would delete senate seats and require two reports (a preliminary report in 2025 and a final report in 2026). Representative Grotta suggested the committee include majority and minority House members to preserve bipartisan balance; Representative Corcoran said he would revise the amendment to address those concerns.
Witnesses and outside commenters — including a former representative, data practitioners and policy advocates — urged the committee to focus on data that already exists and can be published with minimal additional staff work. Several witnesses recommended study committee size be pragmatic; one witness suggested that asking for three senate members might be a heavy lift.
The public hearing closed after committee members said they would circulate a revised amendment addressing membership balance and privacy safeguards. No committee vote was taken on HB 598 during the hearing.
