AB 1555 would require police to provide news agencies access to encrypted radio communications.

The bill comes months after local journalists, including The Desert Sun, lost access to local police radio channels operated by the Eastern Riverside County Interoperable Communications Authority, or ERICA.

ERICA includes Beaumont, Cathedral City, Desert Hot Springs, Indio and Palm Springs.

Assemblyman Todd Gloria, D-San Diego, has introduced a bill that would require police and other public bodies that operate encrypted radio communications to let news media listen to the broadcasts upon request.

AB 1555, introduced on Feb. 22 and amended March 28, comes several months after leaders from five Riverside County cities blocked reporters from listening to an encrypted radio system the cities' police departments use to communicate.

The five cities — Beaumont, Cathedral City, Desert Hot Springs, Indio and Palm Springs — are each members of the Eastern Riverside County Interoperable Communications Authority, or ERICA, a joint powers authority that oversees the cities' shared radio system.

Since it launched in 2010, the radio communications over ERICA have been encrypted so that the general public cannot hear them. But local journalists at The Desert Sun, KESQ, KMIR and City News Service were given an exception that let them continue listening to the radio channels, which helped reporters figure out where to go and who to contact during breaking news situations. The compromise ended in November, when the four news agencies learned that officials serving on ERICA's board had voted to revoke media access to the radios.

Nick Serrano, Gloria's communications director, said the bill was prompted by reports in The Desert Sun and other news organizations.

"What we also noticed was the nationwide trend toward police encrypting radio communications, which begged to Assemblymember Gloria the question of right-of-access," Serrano said in an email. "We believe news media have a right to access police radio communications. As much as this is an issue of transparency and right-of-access, Assemblymember Gloria also sees this as a public safety issue. We rely on media outlets to provide emergency information to the public and much of that is garnered through their access to police radio communications."

Law enforcement agencies across the country have encrypted their radio traffic in recent years, arguing the encryption protects sensitive personal information and prevents suspects from using police radios to evade detection. Some cities, like Denver, have set up a system that would allow journalists to maintain access to otherwise-encrypted radio broadcasts.

But in the case of ERICA, officials from Coachella Valley cities said that they could not grant journalists the ability to tune into encrypted radios because police sometimes use the radios to share sensitive information drawn from the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System, or CLETS, a database of criminal histories, driver records and other databases. Only authorized law enforcement personnel are allowed to access the CLETS for their official duties, and city leaders said letting journalists hear information from the CLETS repeated on police radio channels would violate that restriction.

“If I pulled you over and ran your driver’s license, I get information that is deemed classified,” Chief Travis Walker of Cathedral City, who serves as chairman of the ERICA Technical Advisory Committee, said in a 2018 interview, “and the only people that can hear that information are people that have a right to know and a need to know,” like the police.

Local journalists objected, arguing that losing access to the radios would impede reporters from alerting the public to emergencies, such as wildfires and active shooters as quickly as possible.

AB 1555 would require law enforcement agencies and joint powers authorities that control encrypted police radios to "provide access to the encrypted communications to a duly authorized representative of any news service, newspaper, or radio or television station or network" upon request.

The Peace Officers Research Association of California, which represents more than 70,000 law enforcement personnel, is "actively opposed" to the bill, according to an email statement from spokesperson Chris Steele.

Representatives of the California News Publishers Association and the California Broadcasters Association, two trade groups representing journalists, said they support AB 1555.

Jim Ewert, general counsel for the California News Publishers Association, said the trade group has been getting calls from members shut out of listening to police radios for at least 15 years.

Joe Berry, president and CEO of the California Broadcasters Association, said he sees AB 1555 an extension of the legal principle that lets the press enter restricted zones during emergencies. Under the California Penal Code, representatives of the news media are permitted to access hazardous areas that law enforcement agencies have closed to the general public during floods, earthquakes and other disasters.

Amy DiPierro is a reporter at The Desert Sun in Palm Springs. Reach her at amy.dipierro@desertsun.com or 760-218-2359. Follow her on Twitter @amydipierro.