SACRAMENTO — Citing broad exemptions under California’s legislative records law, the state Senate is keeping secret a taxpayer-funded report about Capitol staff hiring friends and relatives despite calls by lawmakers, statewide candidates and public interest groups that it be released. Peter Scheer, executive director of the First Amendment Coalition, said the Legislature’s special records law should be renamed “the California Legislative Secrecy Law” because it grants lawmakers protections that no other public body has. According to a response last week from Secretary of the Senate Greg Schmidt, the state Senate paid more than $98,000 for the report. Steinberg said during a media briefing in August that he planned to release the nepotism study before the Legislature adjourned for the year at the end of the month. [...] a bipartisan state Senate committee approved a separation agreement with Hidalgo in which the legislative body agreed to pay her $85,400 and pledged to keep that report secret.