Title: Carraway v. Hill
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: 020487
State: Virginia
Issuer: Virginia Supreme Court
Date: January 10, 2003

Present:  All the Justices 
 
BARBARA O. CARRAWAY 
 
v.  Record No. 020487    OPINION BY JUSTICE ELIZABETH B. LACY 
 
 
 
January 10, 2003 
ELIZABETH S. HILL 
 
FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE CITY OF CHESAPEAKE 
Norman Olitsky, Judge Designate 
 
 
In this appeal, we consider whether the Government Data 
Collection and Dissemination Practices Act, Code §§ 2.2-3800 
through –3809 (the Act), applies to constitutional officers. 
 
From January 5 to April 2, 2001, Elizabeth S. Hill was 
employed by a temporary personnel service and assigned to the 
office of the City Treasurer of the City of Chesapeake.  On 
April 2, 2001, Hill became a direct employee of the office.  
Hill's employment with the office ended on April 19, 2001.  In 
May 2001, Hill became a candidate for the position of City 
Treasurer.  Barbara O. Carraway, the incumbent, was running 
for re-election. 
 
During the campaign, Carraway was interviewed by a 
newspaper reporter in response to a newspaper article in which 
Hill accused Carraway of failing to register a charity group 
Carraway operated at her office.  In publishing the interview, 
the reporter quoted Carraway as stating that Hill was 
"released" from the City Treasurer's office after "less than 
three weeks" of employment.  Hill's lawyer subsequently wrote 
to Carraway seeking a retraction of her statements and an 
apology, asserting that Hill had voluntarily resigned her 
employment with the Treasurer's office.  Hill, who had 
obtained her employment file from the City of Chesapeake 
Department of Human Resources, also accused Carraway of 
"padding" Hill's personnel file with negative comments 
concerning her employment by filing certain memoranda after 
her resignation.  The newspaper obtained a copy of this letter 
and published an article detailing its contents. 
 
Carraway's attorney responded to Hill's attorney by 
letter dated October 16, 2001, asserting that Carraway's 
statements were accurate and that, in accord with standard 
office procedure, memoranda concerning Hill's employment were 
transferred from the City Treasurer's employment files to the 
City of Chesapeake Human Resource Department's files after the 
termination of Hill's employment.  Carraway provided the 
newspaper reporter with a copy of this letter. 
 
On October 23, 2001, Hill filed a petition for 
declaratory judgment and injunctive relief asserting that 
Carraway violated the Act by giving the newspaper reporter 
information from Hill's employment file.  Following a bench 
trial, the trial court issued a letter opinion stating that, 
"[b]ased upon all of the evidence presented to the Court, in 
particular the defendant's transmission and release of her 
 
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attorney's letter of October 16, 2001 to the news media," 
Carraway violated the Act.  The trial court entered an order 
enjoining Carraway from committing any further violations of 
the Act "with respect to Elizabeth Hill" and awarded Hill 
attorneys' fees and costs pursuant to Code § 2.2-3809.*  We 
granted Carraway an appeal. 
 
The Government Data Collection and Dissemination 
Practices Act was enacted in response to concerns over 
potentially abusive information-gathering practices by the 
government, including enhanced availability of such personal 
information through technology.  Hinderliter v. Humphries, 224 
Va. 439, 443-44, 297 S.E.2d 684, 686 (1982).  The Act does not 
make such personal information confidential but establishes 
certain practices which must be followed in the collection, 
retention, and dissemination of that information.  Id. at 447, 
297 S.E.2d at 688. 
The specific provision of the Act which Carraway 
allegedly violated was subsection (A)(1) of Code § 2.2-3803.  
That subsection provides  
[a]ny agency maintaining an information system that 
includes personal information shall: 
 
                     
* The trial court's order referred to the predecessor 
statute which was enacted as the Privacy Protection Act of 
1976, Code §§ 2.1-377 through –386, but which was repealed and 
reenacted under its current name without substantive change, 
effective October 1, 2001.  
 
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1.  Collect, maintain, use, and disseminate 
only that personal information permitted or 
required by law to be so collected, maintained, 
used, or disseminated, or necessary to accomplish a 
proper purpose of the agency. 
 
Carraway contends here, as she did below, that a 
constitutional officer does not come within the Act's 
definition of "agency" and, therefore, as Treasurer of the 
City of Chesapeake she was not subject to the provisions of 
the Act.  We agree. 
 
As recited above, the purpose of the Act is to provide 
standards which a government agency must follow in the 
operation of personal information systems.  To accomplish this 
purpose, the provisions of the Act impose specific procedures 
on those agencies.  See Code §§ 2.2-3803, -3805, –3806, -3808.  
The Act defines "agency," in relevant part, as "any agency, 
authority, board, department, division, commission, 
institution, bureau, or like governmental entity of the 
Commonwealth or of any unit of local government including 
counties, cities, towns and regional governments and 
departments . . . ."  Code § 2.2-3801(6).  "Agency" as used in 
the Act refers to an entity that receives its authority 
through legislative or executive action.  See Connell v. 
Kersey, 262 Va. 154, 161, 547 S.E.2d 228, 231 (2001).  In 
contrast, a constitutional officer is an independent public 
official whose authority is derived from the Constitution of 
 
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Virginia even though the duties of the office may be 
prescribed by statute.  See id. at 162, 547 S.E.2d at 232.  
While constitutional officers may perform certain functions in 
conjunction with units of county or municipal government, 
neither the officers nor their offices are agencies of such 
governmental units. 
 
Had the General Assembly intended the Act to include 
constitutional officers, it could have expanded the definition 
of "agency" to reach such constitutional officers.  See e.g., 
Code § 42.1-77 (defining "public official" to include any 
person holding office created by Constitution of Virginia).  
Accordingly, we conclude that the Act does not apply to a city 
treasurer, a constitutional officer.  
 
Hill argued on brief and at oral argument, however, that, 
even if the Act did not apply to the Office of the City 
Treasurer, it did apply to the City of Chesapeake Human 
Resources Department.  Analogizing Carraway's actions to that 
of a member of the board of supervisors in Hinderliter v. 
Humphries, Hill maintains that Carraway violated the Act when 
she provided information held by the Chesapeake Human 
Resources Department to her attorney and subsequently to the 
newspaper reporter.  
 
In Hinderliter, a member of the board of supervisors 
received a copy of a police report containing personal 
 
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information on a police officer which the board member, in 
turn, allowed her daughter to use.  Because the board member 
was entitled to the report in her official capacity, there was 
no violation when the board member was given the information.  
The board member, however, did violate the Act when she 
allowed her daughter access to and use of the report.  Id. at 
449-50, 297 S.E.2d at 689-90. 
 
Hill's application of Hinderliter ignores the distinction 
between the status of a member of the board of supervisors and 
a constitutional officer.  A county board of supervisors comes 
within the Act's definition of "agency" and, therefore, a 
member of such a board is subject to the provisions of the 
Act.  In the instant case, as we have said, Carraway as a 
constitutional officer was not subject to the provisions of 
the Act. 
 
Finally, Hill argues that Carraway is subject to the 
sanctions provided by the Act because Code § 2.2-3809 allows 
an action against "any person or agency that has engaged, is 
engaged, or is about to engage in any acts or practices" in 
violation of the Act.  (emphasis added)  We reject Hill's 
construction of this provision because such a construction 
would subject persons unconnected with a government agency to 
the Act's sanctions.  Rather the phrase "any person" properly 
 
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construed refers to those persons through whom covered 
agencies conduct their business. 
 
Because we conclude that the Act does not apply to 
constitutional officers, we will reverse the judgment of the 
trial court.  Accordingly, we need not address Carraway's 
remaining assignments of error. 
Reversed and final judgment. 
 
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