Guess how much it cost for the borough of State College to replace and reinstall a surveillance camera that was hit by a wayward RV a year ago?

Answer -- $1,072.48.

In my past three columns, I've told you about the laws around open records, my experiences requesting them, and Penn State's reason for keeping records under wraps.

And I promised to share information from the documents I obtained.

Today, I'm delivering the goods.

I wrote letters to five institutions, asking to follow the money.

I requested records from Penn State, Pitt, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, the State System of Higher Education and the State College Borough.

For the universities, I wanted to know how much they spent on meetings of their governing boards.

For the borough, I wanted to know how much the surveillance cameras along part of Beaver Avenue cost.

I received prompt responses and copies of records within the legally allotted time frame from three of the five organizations. Penn State and Pitt, however, held out on me.

Unfortunately, courts have determined that "state-related" colleges -- Pitt and Penn State are two of the four in Pennsylvania -- are not covered by the Right to Know Law. Only state agencies as defined by the law are required to divulge records to people like you and me who request them. If you ask for records from an institution not defined as a state agency, the institution is not legally required to provide them.

If people there give you anything, they're just being nice. By using polite letters drafted by lawyers, Penn State and Pitt both told me, essentially, "You want records? Tough."

So, sadly, I can't tell you how much Penn State's Board of Trustees spent when they met on campus to decide our tuition rates for this year, or how much Pitt spent on a similar meeting. I can, however, tell you about IUP, the state system and the borough.

Three out of five ain't bad, right?

Just under $15,000 of the borough's money went to install cameras in the "Beaver Canyon" section of Beaver Avenue. The rest of the cash for the $32,000 project came from the university and a police grant.

Penn State, through what is listed on the borough ledger as the "public camera project," gave $10,000 toward the cost of cameras. The police grant provided $7,561.12 (don't ask me what the 12 cents is for -- I just don't know). And in 2004 thus far, the borough's spent $825 on camera repairs.

In July, when the State System of Higher Education's board of governors met to approve tuition rates for its 14 universities, the grand total for the meeting was about $3,000. The group met in the state system's boardroom (no rental bill for meeting space), and 10 people participated via teleconference (saves on travel costs, the bulk of the meeting's expenses).

With IUP, the documents I received got into specifics.

The school's council of trustees had coffee (regular and decaf), juice, a fruit tray, mini danishes, mini bagels and mini muffins (perhaps they have small appetites?).

They attended a luncheon and a $25-a-plate dinner, both catered by campus dining services.

The IUP trustees' dinner honored faculty who had become full professors. Hors d'oeurves, if you were wondering, included chicken kabobs. Perhaps that information seems nit-picky and inconsequential.

But open records let you find these things out.

And don't you feel better knowing that a state school paid for chicken kabobs rather than caviar? I wonder if Penn State has a caviar invoice...

Unfortunately, we don't get to know.