(a) The director may open to any person for inspection, copying, and mechanical reproduction, during the department's regular business hours, criminal history information on any individual, if the individual has given written permission for the release of the information to the requester and if the opening of the information is not forbidden by order of any court of competent jurisdiction or by federal law. Any person requesting criminal history information from the department must present to the department, along with the request, a copy of the required written permission.

(b) The director shall establish and collect a nonrefundable fee for costs incurred by the department in providing the requested criminal history information. The fee shall be $25.00. The proceeds shall be deposited in the State Treasury to the credit of the Public Safety Automated Fingerprint Identification System Fund, which is hereby created. All money deposited in the State Treasury to the credit of the Public Safety Automated Fingerprint Identification System Fund shall be expended for the department's administrative costs for maintaining and providing the information and for operations and maintenance of the Automated Fingerprint Identification System. No money shall be withdrawn or expended from the fund for any purpose unless the money has been allotted and budgeted in accordance with Article 4 (commencing with Section 41-4-80) of Chapter 4 of Title 41, and only in the amounts and for the purposes provided by the Legislature in the general appropriations bill or other appropriation bills.

(c) Criminal justice agencies and the Alabama Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission requests for criminal history information are hereby exempted from the fee requirements in subsection (b) except when such requests pertain to municipal or county ordinances intended to screen perspective employees of private entities.

(d) Requests for national criminal history record access, authorized by federal law, passing through the criminal record repository of the department to the Federal Bureau of Investigation require the submission of an additional fee as specified by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to cover their costs of processing the request. In addition to the fee specified in subsection (b) the director shall collect a fee and deposit same into the Public Safety Automated Fingerprint Identification System Fund for payment of the fee specified by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for national criminal history record access.