Indiana Public Access Counselor Heather Willis Neal said this month that East Chicago employees showed a "pattern of unresponsive and nondisclosure" to The Times' request for city spending documents.

So what can be done about it? Sadly, not much.

The Indiana General Assembly has dropped the ball on making public access laws tougher.

Senate Bill 232, which would have put some teeth in those laws, was passed by the Senate but never made it out of the House Committee on Government and Regulatory Reform.

That legislation would allow a judge to impose fines of up to $1,000 against officials or government agencies that blatantly refuse to comply with requests for public records or to follow the rules on making meetings open to the public.

Indiana law does allow the public to take government agencies to task, but that involves the expense of taking an agency to court. Even if the plaintiff wins and gets a ruling that the defendant must pay the winner's legal expenses, that's still a risky proposition that few citizens can afford.

In East Chicago's case, Neal noted that the city violated the spirit and the letter of the state law that requires public officials to disclose to the public how the public's money is spent.

Indiana was in the forefront when then-Gov. Frank O'Bannon established the office of the public access counselor to advise the public and public officials officials on issues related to public access to government meetings and records. It's time to take the next step toward strengthening that commitment.

The Indiana General Assembly has dropped the ball on making public access laws tougher. The East Chicago open records violations show the need to put some teeth into the law to force public officials to be more eager to comply.