February 14, 2006; Red River Water Management Board
2/14/2006 10:14:43 AM
This is an opinion of the Commissioner of Administration issued pursuant to section 13.072 of Minnesota Statutes, Chapter 13 - the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act. It is based on the facts and information available to the Commissioner as described below.
Facts and Procedural History:
On January 5, 2006, IPAD received a letter dated January 2, 2006, from Jim Stengrim. In his letter, Mr. Stengrim asked the Commissioner to issue an advisory opinion regarding his right to gain access to certain data from the Red River Water Management Board (RRWMB). IPAD, on behalf of the Commissioner, wrote to Naomi Erickson, Administrator of RRWMB, in response to Mr. Stengrim's request. The purposes of this letter, dated January 11, 2006, were to inform her of Mr. Stengrim's request and to ask her to provide information or support for the RRWMB's position. On February 3, 2006, IPAD received a response, dated same, from Louis Smith, an attorney representing the RRWMB. A summary of the facts as provided by Mr. Stengrim is as follows. In a letter dated August 25, 2005, he wrote to Ms. Erickson and asked to inspect the following data: 1. Data that shows the specific area the Agassiz Valley Water Management Project provides flood protection for.
In a letter dated September 23, 2005, Mr. Smith wrote to Mr. Stengrim: Your request of August 25, 2005 requests data concerning the Agassiz Valley Water Management Project. The RRWMB will provide its Agassiz Valley project file for your inspection on the dates noted below; you are also directed to the Middle Snake Tamarac Rivers Watershed District [MSTRWD] for further information about the project. In a letter dated October 2, 2005, Mr. Stengrim wrote to Mr. Smith: It is not clear in your letter if the specific data pertaining to the request dated August 25, 2005 will be available for inspection. Please confirm that this specific data will be available and easily identifiable. When Mr. Stengrim went to inspect the data on October 24, 2005, he apparently was presented with a letter, dated same, from Mr. Smith. Mr. Smith wrote: Concerning your request of August 25, 2005, the RRWMB has produced its Agassiz Valley project file for your inspection, and marked the relevant items in the file responsive to your request. Concerning item #2 of that request, please note that the Step One submittal identifies the various stakeholders involved in project initiation; we have not located in the RRWMB's files data concerning specific township initiation, but such data may be available with the MSTRWD. In a letter dated October 31, 2005, Mr. Stengrim wrote to Ms. Erickson: [referring to the inspection] when data to be responsive to [items #1 and #3] was produced for inspection the data did 'not' address the request. In a letter dated November 15, 2005, Ms. Erickson wrote to Mr. Stengrim: The Step 1 submittal and Preliminary Engineer's Report for the Agassiz Valley Water Management Project were produced for your inspection in response to the items you referenced. Further, specific pages were marked in these reports with Post-It notes and clearly identified in reference to your questions. When you stated that you were seeking more specific detail concerning local benefits of the proposed project, we indicated that the information produced was all that was in the possession of the RRWMB on this topic and we referred you to the [MSTRWD] for further information. In his opinion request, Mr. Stengrim wrote: To this date it is unclear if the RRWMB produced all the requested public data. It appears that the RRWMB has been very unclear and ambiguous in responding to the August 25, 2005 data request. Issue:
Based on Mr. Stengrim's opinion request, Mr. Stengrim asked the Commissioner to address the following issue:
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Requests for data
Clarification of request