Opinion
Opinion By: Andy Beshear,Attorney General;Michelle D. Harrison,Assistant Attorney General
Open Records Decision
Leonel Martinez initiated this appeal by letter dated January 5, 2017, challenging the denial by the Kentucky State Penitentiary ("KSP") of two requests that he submitted on December 21, 2016, for the first and last name of a certain officer and the first and last names of two female staff members "who were working canteen window[s] one and two on 12-17-2016," respectively. 1 KSP received the December 21 requests on December 28, 2016, and issued a timely joint response by memorandum dated January 4, 2017, advising that a "public agency is not required to compile information or answer questions, but is only to produce documents . . . which are responsive to a request. Please ask for the specific documents you are needing and we will look for what is needed." Upon receiving notification of Mr. Martinez's appeal from this office, Staff Attorney Catherine M. Stevens, Justice and Public Safety Cabinet, responded on behalf of KSP. Ms. Stevens reaffirmed the agency's position that "requests for information are outside the scope of the [Open Records Act] and an agency is not obligated to honor a request for information. . . . KRS 61.872(3)(b); 14-ORD-103; 07-ORD-065, pp. 1-2; 02-ORD-88, p. 2; 00-ORD-07, p. 3; 95-ORD-48."
Early on, this office clarified that "[t]he purpose of the Open Records Law is not to provide information, but to provide access to public records which are not exempt by law." OAG 79-547, p. 2; 04-ORD-144. For this reason, the Attorney General has consistently held that requests for information as opposed to requests for public records, "need not be honored." 00-ORD-76, p. 3, citing OAG 76-375; 05-ORD-242. In addressing this question, the Attorney General has long recognized that "obviously information will be obtained from an inspection of the records and documents but the duty imposed upon public agencies under the Act is to make public documents available for inspection and copying. " 04-ORD-080, p. 13 (citation omitted). Public agencies are not required under the Act to gather and supply information independent of that which is set forth in public records. Id. "The public has a right to inspect public documents and to obtain whatever [nonexempt] information is contained in them but the primary impact of the Open Records Act is to make records available for inspection and copying and not to require the gathering and supplying of information." Id.
Simply put, "what the public gets is what . . . [the public agency has] and in the format in which . . . [the agency has] it." Id. p. 5, OAG 91-12, p. 5. A review of the statutory language upon which these decisions are premised, including KRS 61.871 (providing that "free and open examination of public records is in the public interest"), KRS 61.872(1) (providing that "[a]ll public records shall be open for inspection by any person"), and KRS 61.872(2) (providing that "[a]ny person shall have the right to inspect public records ") (emphasis added), validates this position. In other words, KSP is not statutorily required to comply with requests which are properly characterized as requests for information. Accordingly, KSP did not violate the Act in denying Mr. Martinez's requests for the names of certain officers and staff members. 2 See 12-ORD-096.
Either party may appeal this decision by initiating action in the appropriate circuit court per KRS 61.880(5) and KRS 61.882. Pursuant to KRS 61.880(3), the Attorney General must be notified of any action in circuit court, but should not be named as a party in that action or in any subsequent proceeding.
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