The New Hampshire Right-to-Know Law, codified at RSA 91-A, lets any citizen inspect governmental records and attend meetings of state and local public bodies, and it puts agencies on a clock when you ask for something in writing. If a request is denied or a board meets in secret without a valid reason, you can take the matter directly to superior court.
What the Law Covers
RSA 91-A reaches two things: governmental records and public meetings. A governmental record is any information created, accepted, or obtained by or on behalf of a public body or agency in carrying out its official functions. That includes paper documents, emails, text messages, digital databases, and recorded audio or video. Written communications received by a majority of a public body count as governmental records even when they were sent outside a formal meeting.
“Public body” is defined broadly. It covers the state legislature (including committee executive sessions), the executive council, any board or commission of a state agency, and every local governing body, school board, planning commission, or advisory committee of any county, town, or school district.1New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:4 – Minutes and Records Available for Public Inspection A tax-exempt corporation whose sole member is the state or a political subdivision also qualifies. In practice, almost any entity exercising governmental authority in New Hampshire falls within the statute.
Attending Public Meetings
Every meeting of a public body must be open to the public. A meeting happens whenever a quorum gathers, in person, by phone, or through any electronic platform that lets members communicate in real time, to discuss or act on matters within the body’s authority. Casual or social encounters don’t count as long as no decisions get made about public business.2New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:2 – Meetings Open to the Public
Notice
Public bodies must post notice of each meeting at least 24 hours in advance, excluding Sundays and legal holidays. Notice goes in two appropriate places, one of which can be the body’s website, or it can be published in a local newspaper of general circulation. A body that posts notices on its website has to use a consistent, reasonably accessible location. A body that doesn’t use its website for notices must still post something on the site telling visitors where notices are kept.2New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:2 – Meetings Open to the Public
Emergencies are the exception. When the chair or presiding officer determines immediate action is necessary, the 24-hour rule is waived, but the body still has to post notice as soon as practicable, use any other reasonably available means to alert the public, and explain the nature of the emergency in the minutes.
Minutes
Minutes must be recorded promptly after every meeting, including nonpublic sessions, and made available for public inspection within five business days. A business day runs from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, excluding state and national holidays. The minutes must list the members present, anyone who appeared before the body, a brief description of subjects discussed, all final decisions, and which members made and seconded each motion.2New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:2 – Meetings Open to the Public A body that maintains a website has to post approved minutes there or post a notice explaining where they can be reviewed.
When a Body Can Meet Privately
RSA 91-A:3 allows a nonpublic session only for specific reasons listed in the statute. A body cannot go behind closed doors just because a topic is sensitive. The motion to enter nonpublic session must state the specific statutory ground on its face, and the vote must be taken by roll call with a majority of members present voting in favor.3New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:3 – Nonpublic Sessions
Permitted grounds include the dismissal, promotion, compensation, discipline, or investigation of a public employee (the employee can require the discussion to be open); hiring a public employee; matters that would likely damage the reputation of someone other than a body member; property acquisitions, sales, or leases where public discussion would benefit adverse parties; pending or threatened litigation involving the body; security issues at correctional facilities; certain confidential commercial or financial information in adjudicative proceedings; and emergency-function planning against deliberate acts of widespread harm. Discussion in the closed session has to stay inside the scope of the motion. Minutes of the nonpublic session are still recorded and follow the same five-business-day rule, though the body may vote to seal them under certain conditions.
How to Request Records
You can inspect governmental records during regular business hours at the offices of the public body or agency that holds them, and you can also request copies.1New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:4 – Minutes and Records Available for Public Inspection There is no mandatory form. Requests can go in by hand-delivery, mail, or email to the relevant records custodian. Writing it down is smart practice because it creates a record of what you asked for and when, which matters if you later need to challenge a delay or a denial.
Describe the records specifically enough that the agency can locate them without guessing. Dates, names, project titles, and subject matter all help. Say whether you want to inspect the records in person or receive copies, and if copies, whether you’d prefer paper or electronic.
Once the request lands, the statute puts the agency on a clock. If the records are ready, they should be produced on the spot. If not, the agency has five business days to do one of three things: make the records available, deny the request in writing with specific legal reasons, or provide a written statement explaining how much more time it needs, along with an itemized cost estimate if a fee applies.1New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:4 – Minutes and Records Available for Public Inspection An agency that ignores a request or lets it sit without any response is violating the law.
What You Can Be Charged
Inspecting records in person is free. The statute prohibits any charge for inspection or delivery of governmental records when no copying is involved, whether the records are in paper, electronic, or any other form.1New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:4 – Minutes and Records Available for Public Inspection When you request copies, the agency can charge you the actual cost of producing them using its own equipment. There is no fixed per-page rate in the statute; the charge has to reflect real cost.
Email and other electronic communications have their own fee structure. The first 250 electronic communications are free. Beyond that, the agency can charge up to $1.00 per communication, whether delivered on paper or electronically. Attachments count as part of their parent message, and a full email thread under a single subject line counts as one communication. Text or chat threads on the same topic count as one communication up to 50 individual messages, with each additional group of 50 treated as another communication.1New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:4 – Minutes and Records Available for Public Inspection Each agency has to adopt a transparent, uniform fee policy that includes a waiver for people who are indigent or can show financial hardship.
Records That Can Be Withheld
Not everything an agency holds is available. RSA 91-A:5 carves out categories that can be withheld, meant to be read narrowly against the general presumption of openness. The protected categories include proceedings of grand and petit juries; deliberations and records of the parole and pardon boards; internal personnel practices such as disciplinary actions and performance evaluations; confidential commercial or financial information whose release could harm a company’s competitive position; individual personnel, medical, welfare, and library-user files where disclosure would invade privacy; test questions, scoring keys, and examination data for licensing, employment, or academic exams; and privacy-invading information like Social Security numbers and private contact details.4New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:5 – Exemptions
When an agency denies a request under one of these categories, it has to cite the specific legal reason in writing. A bare “denied” is not enough. If only part of a record is exempt, the agency should redact the protected portions and release the rest.
If You’re Denied or Shut Out
Any person aggrieved by a violation can petition the superior court for injunctive relief.5New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:7 – Violation There is no administrative appeals board to go through first; the statute routes enforcement straight to the judiciary.
The court can order records released, invalidate action taken at a meeting held in violation of the law, and enjoin the body from future violations.6New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:8 – Remedies If the court finds the lawsuit was necessary to enforce compliance or to address a purposeful violation, the public body is liable for your reasonable attorney’s fees and costs. That fee-shifting piece matters, because a successful challenge doesn’t have to come entirely out of your pocket.
For bad-faith violations the consequences get steeper. The court must impose a civil penalty of $250 to $2,000 against the individual officer, employee, or official who acted in bad faith, and can order that person to reimburse the public body for any attorney’s fees or costs it had to pay. The court can also require the offending official to complete remedial training at their own expense.6New Hampshire General Court. New Hampshire Code 91-A:8 – Remedies Those personal penalties give the statute real teeth: officials who stonewall face consequences that hit them individually, not just the agency’s budget.
Checking State Spending Without a Request
For financial questions in particular, you may not need to file anything. TransparentNH, created by Chapter 65 of the Laws of 2010, is the state’s self-service portal for reviewing how New Hampshire spends tax dollars and other revenue.7State of New Hampshire. TransparentNH It publishes budget information, revenue data, and non-confidential expense reports, and lets you look up state employee compensation (including base salaries and overtime), payments to private vendors and contractors, and agency-level expenditure breakdowns down to checkbook-level detail. Starting there can answer a spending question in minutes and reserve the formal Right-to-Know request for material the portal doesn’t cover.