Opinion
Opinion By: Albert B. Chandler III, Attorney General; James M. Ringo, Assistant Attorney General
Open Records Decision
The question presented in this appeal is whether the Office of the Kenton County Attorney violated the Open Records Act in the disposition of the open records request of Eric C. Deters. For the reasons that follow, we find that the agency's response was in substantial compliance with the Act.
By letter dated December 18, 2001, Mr. Deters made the following request to the Office of the Kenton County Attorney:
I want a copy of every record of any type relative to the prosecution of bad checks. This includes the records you reference in your last letter. I expect them in three, (3) days as required by law.
Whatever record is not produced by copy, I will assume does not exist in your office.
By letter dated December 28, 2001, Garry L. Edmondson, Kenton County Attorney, responded to Mr. Deters request, advising him:
In response to your Open Records Request dated 12/18/01, which my office received 12/26/01, find below my response:
We are asked to determine whether the response of the Office of the Kenton County Attorney violated the Open Records Act. For the reasons that follow, we find that the agency's response was in substantial compliance with the Act, but that any deficiencies in the response were "attributable to the unlimited scope and nonspecificity" of the request. 01-ORD-131.
In the instant case, Mr. Deters' request was for "a copy of every record of any type relative to the prosecution of bad checks." In our view, this was not a properly framed request and is identical to a previous request Mr. Deters made to the Kenton County Fiscal Court and the Office of the County Attorney, which was condemned by the Attorney General in 01-ORD-131. In that decision, we stated, at pages 10-12:
Nor can this office "confirm [that Mr. Deters'] requests" are properly framed records requests, and therefore "subject to the Open Records Act. " KRS 61.872(2) requires a requester to "describe" the records he wishes to access by means of on-site inspection. In construing this provision, the Attorney General has observed:
[A]lthough the purpose and intent of the Open Records Act is to permit "free and open examination of public . . .," this right of access is not absolute. [KRS 61.871.] As a precondition to inspection, a requesting party must identify with "reasonable particularity" those documents which he wishes to review. OAG 89-81; OAG 91-58. Thus, in a series of opinions we have held that, in general, "[b]lanket requests for information on a particular subject without specifying certain documents need not be honored. " OAG 76-375; OAG 83-386; OAG 85-88; OAG 89-81; OAG 91-58.
95-ORD-108, p. 2, 3. "Where the records sought are of an identified, limited class," the Attorney General has concluded, "the requester satisfies the condition" of identifying the records with reasonable particularity. 92-ORD-1261, p. 3.
With limited exception, the records to which Mr. Deters requested access were not identified with "reasonable particularity, " nor were they of an identified, limited class. Rather, his were the "open-ended-any-and-all-records-that-relate-type of requests" that were criticized in 96-ORD-101 and 99-ORD-14. In the latter decision, this office recognized that:
A request for any and all records that contain a name, a term, or a phrase is not a properly framed open records request, and . . . it generally need not be honored. Such a request places an unreasonable burden on the agency to produce often incalculable numbers of widely dispensed and ill-defined records.
99-ORD-14, p. 6. Further, we recognized that:
although "it is the legislative intent that public agency employees exercise patience and long-suffering in making public records available for public inspection, " OAG 77-151, p. 3, public employees "are the servants of all the people and not only of persons who make extreme and unreasonable demands on their time." OAG 76-375, p. 4.
99-ORD-14, p. 5; see also 99-ORD-63. No doubt most of the records identified in Mr. Deters' ill-defined requests are records which the public is entitled to inspect. Nevertheless, such nonspecific requests as "all public records relating to the office of the county attorneys' operation of the bad check prosecutions," and "everything there is on the jail location issue" require a level of "patience and long-suffering" on the part of the agency that the legislature could not have intended.
(Footnotes omitted)
01-ORD-131 is controlling on the issues in this Open Records Appeal. Accordingly, we conclude that the response of the agency, which provided copies of the "Check Fund [Ledger] and the Statement of Revenues & Expenditures 'Cold Check Fund,'" was in substantial compliance with the provisions of the Open Records Act, particularly in light of Mr. Deters' any-and all-type, ill-framed request. 01-ORD-131.
In his appeal, Mr. Deters argues that he was not provided all the records he requested. In addressing disputes between parties as to the records sought, this office, in OAG 89-81, stated:
This office cannot, with the information currently available, adjudicate a dispute regarding a disparity, if any, between records for which inspection has already been permitted, and those sought but not provided. Indeed, such is not the role of this office under open records provisions. It seems clear that you have permitted inspection of some records Mr. Smith asked to inspect, and that copies of some records have been provided. Hopefully any dispute regarding the records here involved can be worked out through patient consultation and cooperation between the parties.
We do note that after receipt of Mr. Deters' letter of appeal, he provided this office with his most recent open records request to the Office of the Kenton County Attorney, dated January 21, 2002, in which he requests more precisely described records from that agency. Accordingly, the parties should consult and mutually cooperate to resolve any differences or misunderstandings related to records sought.
A party aggrieved by this decision may appeal it by initiating action in the appropriate circuit court pursuant to KRS 61.880(5) and KRS 61.882. Pursuant to KRS 61.880(3), the Attorney General should be notified of any action in circuit court, but should not be named as a party in that action or in any subsequent proceeding.
Eric C. DetersP.O. Box 17106Ft. Mitchell, KY 41017
Garry EdmondsonKenton County Attorney303 Court Street, Room 307Covington, KY 41011