Opinion ID: 1293508
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Events Leading to Lawsuit

Text: In November 2001, the petitioners wrote the Iowa Board of Regents request[ing] access to all the financial records of the [Foundation [1] ]..., showing all [its] receipts and disbursements ... from 1990 to the present, together with access to correspondence, memoranda, meeting minutes, directors minutes, reports and the like explanatory of such transactions. In the event this request was denied, the petitioners asked the Board to tell them the reason for doing so and the Board's administrative appeal procedure, if any. The Board of Regents refused the petitioners' requests. The Board told the petitioners the Foundation was a private corporation it did not create or oversee. Although the petitioners and the Board exchanged further correspondence, the Board refused the bulk of the petitioners' requests. In May 2002, the petitioners wrote a letter to the executive director of the ISU Foundation requesting to inspect a substantial amount of the Foundation's records. [2] The petitioners did not want to see any confidential records. [3] See Iowa Code § 22.7 (2001) (listing various exceptions to general rule of disclosure of public records). The Foundation replied that the petitioners' requested date for inspection was not acceptable, mailed the petitioners a copy of its tax returns for the previous three fiscal years, and stated it was considering the petitioners' request and would respond as soon as possible. Although the Foundation provided a limited amount of the requested information in the ensuing weeks, it did not seek an injunction to restrain the petitioners' examination of the materials it did not provide. See id. § 22.8.