Opinion ID: 2829245
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Legislature’s Comprehensive Statutory Scheme for Government Transparency

Text: The stated policy of the PIA is to promote open government. “[I]t is the policy of this state that each person is entitled, unless otherwise expressly provided by law, at all times to complete information about the affairs of government and the official acts of public officials and employees.” Tex. Gov’t Code § 552.001(a). “Public information” includes information that is “collected, assembled, or maintained . . . in connection with the transaction of official business” by a governmental body. Id. § 552.002(a). In general, the PIA is to be liberally construed in favor of granting requests for information. Id. § 552.001(b). Relative to other freedom of information laws, such as FOIA, the Texas PIA more strongly favors transparency and open government. See , e.g. , City of Garland v. Dallas Morning News , 22 S.W.3d 351, 364 (Tex. 2000) (“Unlike the FOIA, our Act contains a strong statement of public policy favoring public access to governmental information and a statutory mandate to construe the Act to implement that policy and to construe it in favor of granting a request for information.”). While the PIA provides an ardent statutory edict for openness in state affairs, the Legislature has protected specified information from disclosure in Subchapter C of the PIA. Tex. Gov’t Code §§ 552.101–.151. A governmental agency is not required to disclose information excepted under Subchapter C of the PIA, but it may disclose such information if it chooses, “unless the disclosure is expressly prohibited by law or the information is confidential under law.” Id . § 552.007. Some examples of information that the PIA excepts from disclosure include information that would give advantage to a competitor or bidder, information in a student record at an educational institution funded wholly or partly by state revenue, and the social security number of a living person. Id . §§ 552.104, .114(a), .147(a). In addition to these exceptions, the Legislature created a special category of information in the PIA— “confidential” information. Information that is considered “confidential” is a subset of the information excepted from disclosure. See id . § 552.101. But, unlike information that is merely excepted from disclosure, the PIA prohibits the disclosure of confidential information and makes its disclosure a crime punishable by: “(1) a fine of not more than $1,000; (2) confinement in the county jail for not more than six months; or (3) both the fine and confinement.” Id. § 552.352. The Legislature specifically identifies in the PIA some information that is considered confidential. 8 Outside of the PIA, no fewer than 100 Texas statutes classify information as confidential for purposes of the PIA. 9 Other statutes specifically limit the scope of “confidential” information. For example, while section 552.147 generally excepts social security numbers of living persons from disclosure, it also explicitly states that it “does not make the social security number of a living person confidential under another provision of this chapter or other law.” Tex. Gov’t Code § 552.147. Other statutes, however, do make social security numbers contained in specified records “confidential” and subject to criminal penalties, such as on voter registration applications and in law enforcement personnel records. See Tex. Elec. Code § 13.004(c); Tex. Gov’t Code § 552.1175. The text of the PIA indicates that the Legislature intended the word “confidential” to have a specific meaning in the PIA, separating highly sensitive information that is prohibited from disclosure (such as the home address of a peace officer) from sensitive information that is merely excepted from disclosure (such as information in a student record). The PIA thus creates three distinct categories of public information—information required to be disclosed, information excepted from mandatory (but not voluntary) disclosure, and confidential information that is prohibited from disclosure and subject to criminal penalties. 1 0 It is within this statutory framework that I consider whether birth dates of public employees are considered to be part of this third category of “confidential information.” As a policy matter, it is admittedly undesirable to release information about public employees that could lead to identity theft. States typically have overwhelmingly addressed this issue by legislation. The Attorney General noted that a number of other states have excepted birth date information in personnel files from open records request disclosures in statutes. 1 1 The Texas Legislature has balanced the competing interests of open government and individual privacy in deciding which types of public information are excepted from disclosure in the PIA. This Court previously acknowledged that this is the Legislature’s role. “Although we recognize that there is often much potential for abuse of information in government records, the task of balancing the public’s right of access to government records against potential abuses of the right has been made by the Legislature; the court’s task is to enforce the public’s right of access given by the Act.” Indus. Found. of the S. v. Tex. Indus. Accident Bd. , 540 S.W.2d 668, 675 (Tex. 1976). The Legislature excepted information for privacy reasons if it has been “considered to be confidential by law, either constitutional, statutory, or by judicial decision.” Tex. Gov’t Code § 552.101. We are constrained therefore not to apply a different, or more expansive meaning of “confidential” for purposes of section 552.101 because it might be good policy to prevent the disclosure of certain information. Our task is to enforce the public’s right to access given by the PIA and adhere to the language of section 552.101 and the statutory scheme set up by the PIA, “not to second-guess the policy choices” that inform these statutes. See McIntyre v. Ramirez , 109 S.W.3d 747, 748 (Tex. 2003). Nowhere in the PIA has the Legislature specifically excepted general birth date information, birth date information combined with other identifying information, or information the disclosure of which is feared may lead to identity theft. The Legislature has enacted specific statutes to protect against identity theft. See Tex. Bus. & Com. Code §§ 72.004, 521.001–523.053. My inquiry, then, is whether birth date information is “confidential” pursuant to section 552.101.