Request By:
Mr. Joe McKnight
Associate Superintendent
Laurel County Schools
1715 South Main Street
London, Kentucky 40741
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; By: Carl Miller, Assistant Attorney General
You have written the Attorney General concerning numerous requests for copies of public records of a Laurel County School District from Mr. George McNulty. Among other things, Mr. McNulty requested photocopies of the official minutes of any special or regular meetings held by the Laurel County Board of Education in 1981. In the same letter, dated May 14, 1981, he requested photocopies of the official minutes of any regular special meetings held in the future.
As to future meetings, an agency is not required by the Open Records Law to automatically send a copy of the minutes of a meeting to a requester. The right to a copy is ancillary to the right to inspect (KRS 61.874(1)) and a person does not have the right to request that copies of future documents be sent to him. Beside the provisions of the Open Records Law, the Open Meetings Law (KRS 61.835) provides as follows:
"The minutes of action taken at every meeting of any public agency, setting forth an accurate record of votes and actions at such meetings, shall be promptly recorded and such records shall be open to public inspection at reasonable times no later than immediately following the next meeting of the body."
As to the minutes of past meetings, we believe it is discretionary with the agency whether to require the requester to first inspect the records before ordering copies or provide the requester a copy of the complete records for a reasonable fee before the requester has inspected them.
If the request for copies of records places an unreasonable burden upon an agency, it may respond to the request by simply telling the requester that he may inspect the records, and then, after he has inspected, order such copies as he desires. (OAG 76-375).