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Advisory Opinion 02-025

July 1, 2002; Minnesota Department of Children, Families and Learning

7/1/2002 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 May 20, 2002, IPAD received a letter from Kevin Pachl. In this letter, Mr. Pachl asked the Commissioner to issue an advisory opinion regarding his right to gain access to certain data maintained by the Minnesota Department of Children, Families and Learning ( CFL ).

In response to Mr. Pachl's request, IPAD, on behalf of the Commissioner, wrote to Christine Jax, Commissioner of CFL. The purposes of this letter, dated May 23, 2002, were to inform her of Mr. Pachl's request and to ask her to provide information or support for CFL's position. On June 11, 2002, IPAD received a response from Kenneth W. Hasledalen, Assistant Commissioner and CIO of CFL. A summary of the facts of this matter follows.

In a letter to Commissioner Jax dated April 16, 2002, Mr. Pachl requested the following: copies of any and all data on all special education complaints filed against Anoka that would document the actual date that CFL received the complaints on and the date that CFL issued their decision on. (Emphasis omitted.) As of the date of his opinion request, CFL had not responded to Mr. Pachl.

In his response to the Commissioner, Mr. Hasledalen stated:

A check of the records confirms that CFL did receive Mr. Pachl's letter via facsimile on April 16, 2002. Mr. Pachl's letter was forwarded to CFL's Data Privacy [sic] Compliance Official who in turn was working with the Department responsible for this information in order to process Mr. Pachl's request. During the same period of time, CFL was working on numerous MN Government Data Practices Requests, which included multiple requests from Mr. Pachl. Because of internal miscommunication about the various requests unfortunately, CFL failed to notify Mr. Pachl that his request was ready for review.

Also, at the same time, CFL was responding to a request by the Department of Administration, Information Policy Analysis Division to provide information related to a request by Mr. Pachl that an advisory opinion be issued on another matter. Because of this pending ruling, counsel was consulted to determine how the issue (unpaid data request) related to the new document request.

CFL was in the process of providing Mr. Pachl notification on this request when it received your letter on May 29, 2002. Upon receiving your letter on May 29, 2002, CFL finished the processing of this request for information. Enclosed please find the letter [dated June 7, 2002] we have sent to Mr. Pachl in response to his request.

In order to avoid this problem in the future, CFL has taken the following action:

CFL will be coordinating any requests pursuant to the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act through the Data Practices Compliance Official.
CFL will notify the requestor of the status of his/her request in a reasonable timeframe.

Issue:

In his request for an opinion, Mr. Pachl asked the Commissioner to address the following issue:

Pursuant to Minnesota Statutes, section 13.03, and Minnesota Rules, part 1204.0300, did the Minnesota Department of Children, Families and Learning respond in an appropriate and timely manner to an April 16, 2002, request for access to data?

Discussion:

Pursuant to Minnesota Statutes, section 13.03, subdivision 2, when an individual requests public data of which s/he is not the subject, government entities are required to respond in an appropriate and prompt manner. Minnesota Rules, part 1205.0300, provides further guidance stating that entities must respond within a reasonable time.

CFL did not respond at all to Mr. Pachl's request until it received notice that the Commissioner intended to issue this Opinion, some seven weeks later. Such a response is neither prompt nor made within a reasonable time.

CFL acknowledges that it did not respond appropriately to Mr. Pachl's request, and that it has taken steps to ensure that such a situation will not recur. The Commissioner notes that he has addressed issues of CFL's failure to respond at all to other data requests from Mr. Pachl in two earlier Advisory Opinions, namely 01-054 and 01-071.

Opinion:

Based on the facts and information provided, my opinion on the issue raised by Mr. Pachl is as follows:

Pursuant to Minnesota Statutes, section 13.03, and Minnesota Rules, part 1204.0300, the Minnesota Department of Children, Families and Learning did not respond in an appropriate and timely manner to an April 16, 2002, request for access to data, because it did not respond at all for seven weeks.

Signed:

David F. Fisher
Commissioner

Dated: July 1, 2002