Request By:
Christopher W. Johnson, Esq.
Legal Office
Kentucky State Police
919 Versailles Road
Frankfort, Kentucky 40601
Opinion
Opinion By: Frederic J. Cowan, Attorney General; Gerard R. Gerhard, Assistant Attorney General, (502) 564-4019
Bill Bishop, a staff writer for the Lexington Herald-Leader, has appealed to the Attorney General, pursuant to KRS 61.880, your September 21, 1988 letter denying his request to furnish him information regarding State Police assignments to executive security duty for the Governor and Lieutenant Governor, as detailed below.
Mr. Bishop's September 19, 1988 request to you stated, in part:
Pursuant to the Kentucky Open Records Act, KRS Chapter 61.870-61.884, I request access to the records regarding State Police Assignments to executive security duty. Specifically, I am requesting information on the number of officers assigned to executive security duty to a) the governor's office and b) the it. governor's office in July and August of 1987 and July and August of 1988. I am also requesting the hours of overtime accumulated during these months by officers assigned to these duties. If any officers permanently assigned to other departments worked in executive security duty during these months, I am also requesting records on their employment.
[Emphasis added]
In your letter of September 21, 1988 (your log No. 88-328) to Mr. Bishop at the Herald-Leader, denying his request, you stated in part:
Your request for information and for access to unspecified records is denied. The agency relies on OAG 76-35 in which the Attorney General opined that 'blanket requests for information on a subject without specifying certain documents need not be honored.'
In his September 27, 1988 letter appealing your denial, Mr. Bishop contended in substance, inter alia, that his request was not a blanket one, that no special compilations would be needed to comply with his request, and that his request was specific, identifying a certain time period for records of a distinct division of the State Police.
OPINION OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
Mr. Bishop asks (1) for information regarding the number of officers assigned to executive security for the Governor and Lt. Governor for specified time periods in 1987 and 1988, (2) the hours of overtime accumulated by the officers in question for those same time periods, and (3) "If any officers permanently assigned to other departments worked in executive security duty during these months, I am also requesting records on their employment."
During a discussion with you at your office on October 4, 1988, you indicated, in substance, the following:
(1) "Executive Security" is not a separate budgetary unit of the Department of State Police with associated expenses being separately documented as to such function.
(2) Although a document exists that indicates the number of officers currently assigned to executive security duty, such document is not maintained on a historical basis, therefore, the number of ofdicers assigned to executive security for specified time periods in the past, cannot be determined by reference to an existing document or existing compilation.
(3) There is no existing document or compilation that accumulates the hours of overtime incurred by officers assigned to executive security duty. Such information would have to be compiled from a laborious review of individual payroll records.
(4) There is no document or compilation that accumulates "records on the employment" (e.g., overtime) of officers permanently assigned to other departments, who worked on executive security assignment for prior time periods.
Simply put, it appears there is no existing record, or compilation of records, that accumulate the information sought by Mr. Bishop. The information would have to be compiled by a laborious review of personnel and payroll records.
In his letter appealing your denial of his request, Mr. Bishop affirmatively indicates his awareness that the information he seeks is not available without a compilation effort. He states (at page 2 of his September 27, 1988 letter):
. . . [T]he information I request should be easy to compile . . . .
KRS 61.872 provides that all public records (except as otherwise provided) shall be open for inspection. If there were records or compilations accumulating the information Mr. Bishop has requested, they would have to be disclosed. The issue here is not whether the request is a blanket one, or whether it is specific, as Mr. Bishop contends. The issue is whether there exist records or compilations that would satisfy his request.
Obviously information documenting, in bits and pieces, facts Mr. Bishop is attempting to determine, will appear among the many records that are generated through the state payroll process and other records through time. Public agencies, however, are neither required nor directed by open records provisions to devote the taxpayer's time to reviewing voluminous records in order to compile information to satisfy a particular information request. The legislature has recognized this by providing only that records must be made available for inspection, not that information must be extracted and compiled. See for example, OAG 81-333.
Since records accumulating or compiling the information he seeks do not exist, and a substantial research and compilation effort would be required to attempt to provide the data he has requested, Mr. Bishop's request may be properly denied.
As required by statute, a copy of this opinion is being sent to the requesting party, Mr. Bill Bishop, who has the right to challenge it in the appropriate circuit court pursuant to KRS 61.880(5) and KRS 61.882.