Cost of COVID records rising

The price tag for documents that could shed light on Georgia's response to the coronavirus pandemic has escalated to nearly $33,000. That’s what the Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency says it will cost to process three Atlanta JournalConstitution requests for pandemic correspondence among top agency officials and Gov. Brian Kemp's office. GEMA also says it will take 1,230 hours to do the work — meaning it could be about eight months before the newspaper receives many of the documents. Some legislators believe government agencies are abusing provisions of the Georgia Open Records Act to stonewall requests for public information.