State Supreme Court: Data underlying electronic documents is public record

by Adnan Alam

By ALEXANDER MacLEAN
Cronkite News Service

PHOENIX (Thursday, Oct. 29) _ The Arizona Supreme Court ruled Thursday that government officials must provide versions of public documents kept electronically in their original formats, a decision that media attorneys and academics said provides more flexibility in reviewing records.

“This opinion holds open the door of public access to information stored electronically by public bodies,” said David Bodney, an attorney who submitted a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of Gannett Co. Inc., The Associated Press and other media organizations. “It keeps Arizona law in step with emerging technology.”

The unanimous decision in Lake v. City of Phoenix affirms the right to metadata _ or data about data _ within public records that are kept electronically. For example, those asking government officials for a memorandum or performance appraisal can get the files in the format of the word-processing program used, which can reveal when and how the file has been changed.

The ruling also will help members of the public obtain government data in native database or spreadsheet formats rather than in Portable Document Format or another means that provides no more flexibility or information than paper.

“They still have to comply with the Arizona Public Records Law,” said Dan Barr, an attorney who submitted a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of the Arizona First Amendment Coalition, Society of Professional Journalists and Arizona Newspapers Association. “And what the Arizona Supreme Court is saying is that we’ll have to treat electronic records no differently than we treat paper records.”

The ruling vacates an appeals court decision in a lawsuit that David Lake, a police officer, brought against the city of Phoenix. Lake suspected that superiors demoted him improperly and wanted access to the metadata behind supervisors’ notes that he contended were backdated, but the city declined on the grounds that metadata wasn’t public record.

Lake said the ruling means more than just a victory in his case.

“The biggest reward is it’s another tool to hold government officials accountable,” he said.

Phoenix City Attorney Gary Verburg said the ruling will put more pressure on government officials who already handle a multitude of public records requests. But he said it’s beneficial to have guidance on how the state’s public records law applies to electronic records.

“People sometimes ask the records officials to go on fishing expeditions,” he said. “Now we have to do more than just copy a document. We will have to bring in computer techs to ferret out the metadata, and it’s going to increase the workload.”

The high court, however, said the ruling is unlikely to create what the city contended would be an “administrative nightmare.”

“A public entity is not required to spend ‘countless hours’ identifying metadata; instead, it can satisfy a public records request merely by providing the requestor with a copy of the record in its native format,” said the opinion written by Justice W. Scott Bales.

David Cuillier, a University of Arizona assistant professor of journalism, said the ruling will save members of the public money by allowing them to obtain large public records such as database information without having to pay fees associated with copying.

“There are many agencies in Arizona that have used this tactic to hide information and frustrate citizens and journalists because they claim that they get to pick the format of the record,” said Cuillier, who serves as the Society of Professional Journalists’ national freedom of information chair.

Metadata is important because it can explain information that is in a record, such as identifying what a code in a database stands for, said Steve Doig, Knight Chair in Journalism at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication and a nationally recognized expert on computer-assisted reporting.

“If the public records law is going to be upheld, it is important that the person who is getting the public record not only get the raw record but also the material necessary to understand it,” Doig said.

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Web Links:
_ Arizona Supreme Court: www.supreme.state.az.us