FOIL-AO-16793

 

September 20, 2007

The staff of the Committee on Open Government is authorized to issue advisory opinions. The ensuing staff advisory opinion is based solely upon the information presented in your correspondence.

Dear

As you are aware, I have received your letter concerning your ability to obtain records from the Town of Almond Assessor. Please accept my apologies for the delay in response.

By way of background, you purchased a home in the Town in 2000, but your property “has been selectively assessed every other year”, even though no improvements to the property have been made. You have filed grievances and prevailed in court “all three times.” As the matter pertains to the Freedom of Information Law, you wrote that you have twice requested the Assessor’s 2007 annual report of the final assessment roll and the statement changes determined by the Board of Assessment Review. According to your letter, the Assessor has neither responded in a timely manner nor disclosed the records. She also contends that you must “go to Allegany County (25 miles away) to obtain this information.”

In this regard, I offer the following comments.

First, the Freedom of Information Law is applicable to all records of an agency, such as a town, for §86(4) of that statute defines the term “agency” expansively to mean:

"...any state or municipal department, board, bureau, division, commission, committee, public authority, public corporation, council, office or other governmental entity performing a governmental or proprietary function for the state or any one or more municipalities thereof, except the judiciary or the state legislature."

Based on the foregoing, insofar as the Assessor maintains the records of your interest, I believe that they constitute Town records subject to rights of access and that the Town must deal with your request appropriately.

Second, §89(1) of the Freedom of Information Law requires the Committee on Open Government to promulgate regulations concerning the procedural implementation of that statute (21 NYCRR Part 1401). In turn, §87(1) requires the governing body of a public corporation, i.e., a town board, to adopt rules and regulations consistent those promulgated by the Committee and with the Freedom of Information Law. Further, §1401.2 of the regulations provides in relevant part that:

“(a) The governing body of a public corporation and the head of an executive agency or governing body of other agencies shall be responsible for insuring compliance with the regulations herein, and shall designate one or more persons as records access officer by name or by specific job title and business address, who shall have the duty of coordinating agency response to public requests for access officers shall not be construed to prohibit officials who have in the past been authorized to make records or information available to the public form continuing from doing so.”

As such, the Town Board has the duty to promulgate rules and ensure compliance.

Section 1401.2 (b) of the regulations describes the duties of a records access officer and states in part that:

“The records access officer is responsible for assuring that agency personnel...

(4) upon locating the records, take one of the following actions:
(i) make records promptly available for inspection; or
(ii) deny access to the records in whole or in part and explain in writing the reasons therefor.
(5) Upon request for copies of records:
(i) make a copy available upon payment or offer to pay established fees, if any; or
(ii) permit the requester to copy those records...”

Based on provisions quoted above, the records access officer must "coordinate" an agency's response to requests.

In the great majority of towns, the town clerk is the records access officer. By statute, the clerk is the legal custodian of all town records [see Town Law, §30(1)] and the records management officer (see Arts and Cultural Affairs Law, §57.19). If the clerk is the records access officer, it is his/her responsibility to coordinate the Town’s response to requests. Further, if the Assessor has not been designated as the records access officer by the Town Board, I do not believe that she has the authority to deny your request.

Third, the Freedom of Information Law provides direction concerning the time and manner in which agencies must respond to requests. Specifically, §89(3) of the Freedom of Information Law states in part that:

"Each entity subject to the provisions of this article, within five business days of the receipt of a written request for a record reasonably described, shall make such record available to the person requesting it, deny such request in writing or furnish a written acknowledgement of the receipt of such request and a statement of the approximate date, which shall be reasonable under the circumstances of the request, when such request will be granted or denied...”

It is noted that new language was added to that provision on May 3, 2005 (Chapter 22, Laws of 2005) stating that:

“If circumstances prevent disclosure to the person requesting the record or records within twenty business days from the date of the acknowledgement of the receipt of the request, the agency shall state, in writing, both the reason for the inability to grant the request within twenty business days and a date certain within a reasonable period, depending on the circumstances, when the request will be granted in whole or in part.”

Based on the foregoing, an agency must grant access to records, deny access in writing, or acknowledge the receipt of a request within five business days of receipt of a request. When an acknowledgement is given, it must include an approximate date within twenty business days indicating when it can be anticipated that a request will be granted or denied. However, if it is known that circumstances prevent the agency from granting access within twenty business days, or if the agency cannot grant access by the approximate date given and needs more than twenty business days to grant access, it must provide a written explanation of its inability to do so and a specific date by which it will grant access. That date must be reasonable in consideration of the circumstances of the request.

The amendments clearly are intended to prohibit agencies from unnecessarily delaying disclosure. They are not intended to permit agencies to wait until the fifth business day following the receipt of a request and then twenty additional business days to determine rights of access, unless it is reasonable to do so based upon “the circumstances of the request.” From my perspective, every law must be implemented in a manner that gives reasonable effect to its intent, and I point out that in its statement of legislative intent, §84 of the Freedom of Information Law states that "it is incumbent upon the state and its localities to extend public accountability wherever and whenever feasible." Therefore, when records are clearly available to the public under the Freedom of Information Law, or if they are readily retrievable, there may be no basis for a delay in disclosure. As the Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court, has asserted:

"...the successful implementation of the policies motivating the enactment of the Freedom of Information Law centers on goals as broad as the achievement of a more informed electorate and a more responsible and responsive officialdom. By their very nature such objectives cannot hope to be attained unless the measures taken to bring them about permeate the body politic to a point where they become the rule rather than the exception. The phrase 'public accountability wherever and whenever feasible' therefore merely punctuates with explicitness what in any event is implicit" [Westchester News v. Kimball, 50 NY2d 575, 579 (1980)].

In a judicial decision concerning the reasonableness of a delay in disclosure that cited and confirmed the advice rendered by this office concerning reasonable grounds for delaying disclosure, it was held that:

“The determination of whether a period is reasonable must be made on a case by case basis taking into account the volume of documents requested, the time involved in locating the material, and the complexity of the issues involved in determining whether the materials fall within one of the exceptions to disclosure. Such a standard is consistent with some of the language in the opinions, submitted by petitioners in this case, of the Committee on Open Government, the agency charged with issuing advisory opinions on FOIL”(Linz v. The Police Department of the City of New York, Supreme Court, New York County, NYLJ, December 17, 2001).

If neither a response to a request nor an acknowledgement of the receipt of a request is given within five business days, if an agency delays responding for an unreasonable time beyond the approximate date of less than twenty business days given in its acknowledgement, if it acknowledges that a request has been received, but has failed to grant access by the specific date given beyond twenty business days, or if the specific date given is unreasonable, a request may be considered to have been constructively denied [see §89(4)(a)]. In such a circumstance, the denial may be appealed in accordance with §89(4)(a), which states in relevant part that:

"...any person denied access to a record may within thirty days appeal in writing such denial to the head, chief executive, or governing body, who shall within ten business days of the receipt of such appeal fully explain in writing to the person requesting the record the reasons for further denial, or provide access to the record sought."

Section 89(4)(b) was also amended, and it states that a failure to determine an appeal within ten business days of the receipt of an appeal constitutes a denial of the appeal. In that circumstance, the appellant has exhausted his or her administrative remedies and may initiate a challenge to a constructive denial of access under Article 78 of the Civil Practice Rules.

I note that on August 16, 2006, Governor Pataki signed into law, effective immediately, legislation that broadens the authority of the courts to award attorney’s fees when government agencies fail to comply with the Freedom of Information Law (S. 7011-A, Chapter 492). Under the amendments, when a person initiates a judicial proceeding under the Freedom of Information Law and substantially prevails, a court has the discretionary authority to award costs and reasonable attorney’s fees when the agency had no reasonable basis for denying access to records, or when the agency failed to comply with the time limits for responding to a request.

In an effort to enhance compliance with and understanding of the Freedom of Information Law, copies of this response will be sent to Town officials.

I hope that I have been of assistance.

Sincerely,

 

Robert J. Freeman
Executive Director

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cc: Town Board
Town Clerk
Martha A. Thompson, Assessor