The Supreme Court of California declined Wednesday to block a law requiring state police departments to publicly disclose reports arising from improper officer use of force.

The San Bernadino County Sheriff’s Employees’ Benefit Association, a police employee union in San Bernadino county, petitioned the court to block the release of records from before 2019, arguing that releasing records from before the beginning of the year would cause “irreparable harm to the statutory and constitutional rights of SEBA members” should it apply to past reports. The court refused the petition and request to stay the law without a written opinion, authorizing the release of police records prior to the effective date of the legislation.

Passed in August of 2018, Senate Bill 1421 loosened California’s police privacy laws in cases of gross misconduct or excessive use of force, allowing public access to previously confidential records and reports. The law was passed in response to widespread concerns about excessive police use of force across the country, especially against minority victims. California’s police privacy laws were among the strictest in the nation before the passage of SB 1421, with California as one of the only states that completely prohibited public access to internal police reports. SEBA argued in their petition that the law only applied to reports made after the amendment’s effective date, January 1, 2019, and that there was no language in the bill that required departments to release records from before then. The petition was opposed by a broad collection of journalist organizations and First Amendment advocates, including the American Civil Liberties Union, the Los Angeles Times and the California News Publishers Association.

Though the Supreme Court’s refusal to stay the law authorizes news agencies, journalists and other members of the public to request older police records across the state, a district court judge in Los Angeles previously issued a separate stay pending a trial in February.