I thought it worth noting that Carver County is continuing to willfully and deliberately violate the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act.
I submitted a request on March 14 2018 for :
" Any and all correspondence, documents, letters, electronic messages, memoranda, social media communications, telephone messages and any other forms of data which include the name Noah McCourt. "
Although the results of data request to the City of Chaska revealed that Mr. Hemze read the request and forwarded it to the County Attorney shortly thereafter and despite Chief deputy Poison Petey patting himself on the back over the fact that he "routinely offers opinions on the MGDPA" they failed to respond accordingly.
State Statute 13.04 clearly states that:
"The responsible authority or designee shall comply immediately, if possible, with any request made pursuant to this subdivision, or within ten days of the date of the request, excluding Saturdays, Sundays and legal holidays, if immediate compliance is not possible....."
Carver county failed to acknowledge that they had received the data request for over a month following it's submission.
This provision of statute isn't shrouded in ambiguity. It's pretty black and white that the County had 10 days to respond to me and failed to do so and if that isn't bad enough there are numerous other violations of the Minnesota Data Practices Act ( Minn. Stat. chapter 13)
A. CARVER COUNTY FAILED TO COMPLY WITH 10 DAY REQUIREMENT FOR DATA SUBJECTS IN MINN. STAT 13.04
Minnesota Statute 13.04 states that when an individual requesting data is the subject of the data ..
"The responsible authority or designee shall comply immediately, if possible, with any request made pursuant to this subdivision, or within ten days of the date of the request, excluding Saturdays, Sundays and legal holidays, if immediate compliance is not possible....."
Carver County's response came over a month following the initial request.
The Commissioner of Administration opined in Data Practices Advisory opinion 18--005 that:
"notwithstanding the attorney conduct concerns, the County’s obligation under the Data Practices Act to comply immediately or in ten business day with a data subject’s request was clear. "
As the Commissioner noted in Advisory Opinion 03-030:
"The Commissioner acknowledges that circumstances can arise that make it more difficult for government entities to fulfill their duties under Chapter 13. Nevertheless, the District was obligated, per section 13.04, subdivision 3, to provide X with access to the data requested within ten working days. The statute does not provide additional time for mitigating circumstances."
Despite the existence of these clearly established procedures, the county ignore them and failed to provide data requested by a data subject as stated in Minn. Stat. 13.04
B. CARVER COUNTY FAILED TO COMPLY WITH APPROPRIATENESS AND TIMELINESS REQUIREMENTS IN MINN STAT 13.03 SUBDIV 2(a)
The Minnesota Government Data Practice Act requires that responsible authorities:
"establish procedures....to ensure that requests for government data are received and complied with in an appropriate and prompt manner" Minn Stat. 13.03 subdiv 2 (a). Furthermore the responsible authority "shall establish procedures to provide for response to a request for access within a reasonable time" Minn R. 1205.0300 subp.3 as such government entities are obligated to know what type of data they have, how to access it and how it is classified BEFORE a request is submitted pursuant to the MGDPA (Minn Stat chapter 13)
Carver County's response was neither appropriate nor prompt. As an initial matter, their first substantive response came over a month after the initial request was submitted.
The County then cited that the request was burdensome and cited Minnesota Attorney Rule of ethics, while refusing to provide me with any updates on what steps they were taking to provide the data he requested. Even once they began complying with the MGDPA, they failed to fully respond
The commissioner of Administration has opined that while the statutory language of "appropriate and timely manner" is not defined as a distinct amount of time.
For the first month I received no response and thus I had no indication as to how much data my request would result in. However an appropriate and timely response is required even for broad and vague requests.
The commissioner of administration has opined in opinion 97-055 regarding a requester seeking data on 209 government employees
" given the extent of the request it would be appropriate to communicate that it would take some time to compile the data and to give an approximation of when the requestor will be able to have access. Instead [the entity]...has not responded for 4 weeks and not provided the requestor with access in more than 7 weeks after the receipt of the request. The commissioner is of the opinion that this is neither prompt nor reasonable "
I expressed a desire to inspect the data in a timely manner, a concept affirmed by the state Legislature in their passage of the MGDPA and repeatedly addressed in the opinions of the commissioner
Carver County has established a pattern of delayed compliance and communication, the ignoring of communication, a refusal to disclose its activities in regards to the request and a failure to provide statutory citations justifying redactions.
C. CARVER COUNTY HAS FAILED TO KEEP RECORDS CONTAINING GOVERNMENT DATA IN SUCH AN ARRANGEMENT AND CONDITION TO MAKE THEM EASILY ACCESSIBLE FOR CONVENIENT USE AS REQUIRED BY MINN STAT. 13.03 subdiv 1
The MGDPA provides that responsible authorities must "keep records containing public data in such an arrangement and condition to make them easily accessible for convenient use" Minn Stat 13.03 subdiv 1
The County's indication that what should be a standard email search using standard text keyword criterion would take the installation of entire new programs and ultimately manually printing 3000 documents indicates that the County isn't in compliance with this aspect of the law.
In advisory opinion 94-032, the commissioner of Administration opined that the "easily accessible for convenient use" statutory language "
"places an affirmative duty on government agencies to design data storage, data retrieval, records storage and filings systems in such a way that will assist not hinder the public in accessing government data. "
The commissioner also noted that this language has been "part of a legislatively enacted policy in this state since 1941" he continued on to say that
" virtually every modern record keeping or information management system both manual and electronic that has come into existence in this state in the past 50 years has been subject to the requirement that they be designed and implemented to contain data within them that will be "easily accessible for convenient use" by the public "
A data request to the City of Chaska revealed correspondence between Chief deputy Carver County Attorney Peter Ivy from the City of Chaska in which Attorney Ivy stated that the County was installing new software to better respond to data requests
In advisory opinion 00-067, the commissioner opined that a state agency was not in compliance with the MGDPA when technical limitations impeded compliance.
"The data requestor having to wait months for a new server to be ordered, delivered and installed so that a back up tape can be reviewed is not keeping records in a way that makes them easily accessible for convenient use. Agencies need to proactively prepare their computer systems so that they are able to respond to data requested including review of back up tapes. Waiting for a data request and then determining that data isn't responsive to statutory authority " the Commissioner went on "It would be appropriate at this point that the tape be sent to a vendor for review, the data requestor should not have to wait any longer.[The Government entity]....should have acted more promptly in reviewing the back up tapes thereby meeting the requirement to produce public data "as soon as reasonably possible"
In advisory opinion 03-025, another Minnesota county presented the argument that "Due to limitations of the present computer equipment [complying with a data request]...is a time consuming and laborious process which typically results in computer crashes or printer jams. "
The Commissioner opined that the entity was not in compliance with the MGDPA because the data was not easily accessible for convenient use, as required by statute. Like Respondents, this agency then claimed the burden of the data request was interfering with County business. The Commissioner countered that claim by stating that “providing the public with appropriate access to public government data . . . is County business” (emphasis added).
C. CARVER COUNTY HAS STILL NOT RESPONDED TO MCCOURTS REQUEST FOR DATA IN VIOLATION OF MINN STAT 13.03 subdiv 3
Minn. Stat. 13.03, subd. 3 establishes that :
“Upon request to a responsible authority or designer a person shall be permitted to inspect and copy public government data at reasonable times and places and upon request shall be informed of the data's meaning."
The foregoing facts establish that the County has failed to comply with my request for access to data thus violating MINN STAT 13.03 subdiv 3
D. CARVER COUNTY FAILED TO PROVIDE WRITTEN CERTIFICATION AND STATUTORY CITATIONS FOR ITS REDACTIONS VIOlATES MINN STAT. 13.03 subdiv 3
After asking numerous times including in the original request submitted March 14 2018, Carver County did not provide written certification or statutory citation for its redactions, and did not disclose if any other data was withheld
Over 24 weeks after the original data request , the county still has not provided any statutory citations to justify any of their redactions or fulfilled the data request.
E. CARVER COUNTY'S ENTIRE PROCESS FOR RESPONDING TO DATA REQUESTS FAILS TO MEET STATUTORY REQUIREMENT
The Minnesota Supreme Court decided in Webster V Hennepin County that Hennepin County and Sheriff Rich Stanek violated the MN data practices act simply due to the facts that their process for handling data requests was ineffective. The court citing as justification for its ruling that there was
”substantial evidence of the County's missteps in responding to Webster's request lead inexorably to the conclusion that the existing procedures were insufficient to meet the statutory requirements
F. CARVER COUNTY's ACCESS POLICY VIOLATES MINN STAT 13.025
State statute 13.025 outlines the duties of the responsible authority. Chief Deputy Peter Ivy failed to perform his duties as the County's responsible authority which resulted in numerous violations of the MGDPA.
The commissioner of administration opined in Advisory opinion 18--005 that:
"The County’s current access policy for data subjects identifies the Chief Deputy County Attorney as the Responsible Authority for offices not otherwise designated by statute. Thus, given the Chief Deputy’s prosecutorial responsibilities, it seems likely that situations similar to this one will arise in the future. The Commissioner encourages the County to revisit its access policies and procedures so that any issues related to representation or apparent conflicts of interest do not interfere with the statutory time limits for responding to requests. "
In short, Poison Petey's sanctimonious ramblings and specious arguments are laughable and are indicative of the larger problem of incompetence and bumbling buffoonery that is becoming more and more of an expectation of the Carver county Attorney's office. I particularly enjoy his self aggrandizing claim that he routinely offers opinions on the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act. I don't know what law school he went to and I don't really care but if I were him I'd stop looking at my own reflection for a sec, put down the mirror and call them up and ask for a refund.
