I 

116TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION H. R. 1164 

To direct the Director of the Administrative Office of the United States 

Courts to consolidate the Case Management/Electronic Case Files system, 

and for other purposes. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

FEBRUARY 13, 2019 

Mr. COLLINS of Georgia (for himself, Mr. QUIGLEY, Mr. DAVID P. ROE of 

Tennessee, and Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia) introduced the following bill; 

which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary 

A BILL 

To direct the Director of the Administrative Office of the 

United States Courts to consolidate the Case Management/Electronic Case Files system, and for other purposes. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Electronic Court 

5 Records Reform Act of 2019’’. 


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1 SEC. 2. CONSOLIDATION OF THE CASE MANAGEMENT/ELEC2 TRONIC CASE FILES SYSTEM. 

3 (a) IN GENERAL.—Not later than 2 years after the 

4 date of the enactment of this Act, the Director of the Ad5 ministrative Office of the United States Courts, in coordi6 nation with the Administrator of General Services, shall 

7 consolidate the Case Management/Electronic Case Files 

8 system, and shall develop one system for all filings with 

9 courts of the United States, which shall be administered 

10 by the Administrative Office of the United States Courts. 

11 (b) USE OF TECHNOLOGY.—In developing the system 

12 under subsection (a), the Director shall use modern tech13 nology in order— 

14 (1) to improve security, data accessibility, af15 fordability, and performance; and 

16 (2) to minimize the burden on pro se litigants. 

17 (c) AVAILABILITY TO STATES.— 

18 (1) IN GENERAL.—A State may choose to par19 ticipate in the system developed under this section. 

20 (2) FEE.—The Director shall charge a fee to a 

21 State that chooses to participate in the system, 

22 which is set at a level to recover the cost of pro23 viding the services associated with the administra24 tion and maintenance of the system to the State. 


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1 SEC. 3. PUBLIC ACCESS TO COURT ELECTRONIC RECORDS 

2 SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS. 

3 (a) IN GENERAL.—Not later than 2 years after the 

4 date of the enactment of this Act, the Director of the Ad5 ministrative Office of the United States Courts, in coordi6 nation with the Administrator of General Services, shall 

7 update the Public Access to Court Electronic Records sys8 tem, which shall be subject to the following requirements: 

9 (1) A document filed with a court shall be made 

10 publicly accessible upon filing, except as ordered by 

11 a court or by rule of the Judicial Conference. 

12 (2) All documents on the system shall be avail13 able to the public and to parties before the court 

14 free of charge. 

15 (3) Any information that is prohibited from 

16 public disclosure by law or court order shall be re17 dacted. 

18 (4) All documents shall be text-searchable and 

19 machine-readable. 

20 (5) To the extent practicable, external websites 

21 shall be able to link to documents on the system. 

22 (6) The system shall include digital audio and 

23 visual files of court recordings, when such files are 

24 available. 

25 (7) The system shall provide search functions 

26 for public use. 


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1 (b) MINIMIZING THE BURDEN ON PRO SE LITI2 GANTS.—In developing the system to comply with the re3 quirements under subsection (a), the Director shall, to the 

4 extent practicable, not impose a disproportionate impact 

5 on pro se litigants. 

6 (c) USE OF TECHNOLOGY.—In developing the system 

7 under subsection (a), the Director shall use modern tech8 nology in order— 

9 (1) to improve security, data accessibility, af10 fordability, and performance; and 

11 (2) to minimize the burden on pro se litigants. 

12 (d) AUTHORITY TO EXEMPT CERTAIN DOCU13 MENTS.—The Director may identify categories of docu14 ments which are not made publicly accessible under sub15 section (a)(1), and categories of court proceedings, the re16 cordings of which are not made available under subsection 

17 (a)(6). 

18 SEC. 4. DEFINITION OF MACHINE-READABLE. 

19 In this Act, the term ‘‘machine-readable’’ means a 

20 format in which information or data can be easily proc21 essed by a computer without human intervention while en22 suring no semantic meaning is lost. 

Æ 


kjohnson on DSK79L0C42 with BILLS