NPPA Continues Objections To Photography Restrictions On Public Lands

 

DURHAM, NC (April 22, 2010) – The National Press Photographers Association has notified the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests and its chairman, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), by letter that the organization continues to object to an amendment to a public law that would require an annual fee and a permit in order to photograph on public lands. NPPA believes that the proposal doesn't make a sufficient distinction for media and offers no exemption for news coverage.

"NPPA asserts that under the protection of the First Amendment – no fees or permits should be required for journalists reporting on public lands issues, land use, or recreational activities thereon," NPPA's president Bob Carey and NPPA's general counsel Mickey H. Osterreicher wrote to Sen. Wyden.

Today's objection is a continuation of NPPA's concern with the Department of Interior's proposal to change its rules and impose news restrictions on photography on public lands. In December 2007, NPPA past president Tony Overman testified before the House Natural Resources Committee voicing NPPA's objections to the proposed rule changes and NPPA joined with other organizations to suggest possible remedies to the inequities, selective enforcement, and procedural confusion that has accompanied the current regulations as individuals have attempted to interpret and enforce the rules across multiple park locations.

For many year the Department of Interior (DOI) did not restrict news photography on public land or require photojournalists to submit to a fee-and-permit process. In 2007, however, DOI proposed to amend its rules to establish fees for “commercial filming activities or similar projects, such as still photography.” Under the proposal, DOI would require many photographers to pay a fee, receive a permit, and submit to significant conditions before being allowed to photograph on public land. The proposed rules provide that “[n]ews coverage does not require a permit,” and it therefore appeared that the Department intended to exclude journalists from these requirements.

NPPA's letter to Sen. Wyden today told the chairman, "While we acknowledge the Department’s efforts to protect our nation’s natural resources we are concerned that the rules and in particular this amendment do not draw the bright line that is necessary to exclude all journalistic activities from the commercial photography requirements. Instead, NPPA believes that this amendment further confuses the issue and will create additional problems for our members."

Carey wrote, "We urge the subcommittee to avoid adopting language that could undermine the ability of photojournalists - in particular, freelancers and those associated with small news organizations - to carry out their duties. Any measure enacted should maintain Congress’ presumption that still photography is always permitted on public land unless it falls into one of the narrow exceptions that Congress included in the Department’s authorizing statute. Therefore, we suggest that any permit and fee regulation be based upon the level of disruption caused by the activity rather than upon the end-use of the images being recorded."

The amendment, as drafted, would give DOI employees excessively broad discretion to define what is and is not news, Carey said.

"That result, of course, would be entirely inconsistent with the government’s constitutional obligation to avoid defining or regulating the collection and reporting of news and with our government’s tradition of openness and fairness to the press."

Given the millions of photographers who visit public lands each year, Carey says that it would simply be unworkable to charge DOI personnel with the responsibility of drawing complicated and ultimately arbitrary lines between whether photography is or is not commercial.

"To avoid creating this situation, any permit-and-fee amendment should explicitly exclude application in any circumstance to photojournalists or to the collection or reporting of news and should make clear that both the activities of freelance photojournalists and coverage of all news stories, not simply 'breaking' news, are permitted without restriction, permit or fee."

 

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