State Lawmakers Seek To Shield Reasons For Expenses

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – The Pennsylvania Legislature is concealing who lawmakers and staff met with and why in records on how it spends its roughly $360 million annual budget. The Caucus and Spotlight PA news organizations report that lawyers in the nation’s largest full-time Legislature cite the speech and debate clause in the state Constitution. But good-government advocates say that the speech and debate clause was intended to allow lawmakers to speak freely in official proceedings. Thousands of pages of financial records turned over in response to public records requests contained vague descriptions of expenses or redactions that made it impossible to see their purpose.