Opinion ID: 1280889
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Is the Check Distribution List a Public Record or Other Matter of the State of Arizona?

Text: Arizona's Public Records Law provides that: Public records and other matters in the office of any officer at all times during office hours shall be open to inspection by any person. A.R.S. § 39-121 (emphasis added). The statute does not define public records or other matters, but these terms have been defined by Arizona case law. The Arizona statute, adopted in 1901, was taken from a California provision. Arizona Bd. of Regents v. Phoenix Newspapers, 167 Ariz. 254, 257, 806 P.2d 348, 351 (1991). Consequently, cases arising under the California statute are helpful to the interpretation of our law. [3] In most cases, the fine distinction between public records and other matters is not a point in controversy. Therefore, where the record may fall within either category, we dispens[e] with an initial determination of whether a document is a `public record' or an `other matter' and mov[e] directly to a determination of whether or not the countervailing interests enunciated in Mathews v. Pyle ... override the policy of disclosure. Carlson, 141 Ariz. at 490, 687 P.2d at 1245 (sheriff's offense report regarding an assault by one inmate on another was generated pursuant to his official statutory duty and was subject to disclosure); see also Little, 130 Ariz. at 416-17, 636 P.2d at 664-65. In this case, however, the first issue is whether the check distribution list is a public record or other matter of the state rather than a private federal-tribal record. We have found no case that presents analogous facts and therefore consider the arguments raised by looking to the statute and applicable legal principles to determine whether the list is subject to disclosure.
Phoenix Newspapers asserts that because the state treasurer possessed the check distribution list, it qualifies as a public record. The relevant case law emphasizes that the mere fact that a writing is in the possession of a public officer or public agency does not make it a public record. See, e.g., People v. Olson, 232 Cal. App.2d 480, 486, 42 Cal. Rptr. 760, 764 (1965); City Council of Santa Monica v. Superior Court, 204 Cal. App.2d 68, 73, 21 Cal. Rptr. 896, 899 (1962). As the Iowa Supreme Court noted in Linder v. Eckard: Not every document which comes into the possession or custody of a public official is a public record. It is the nature and purpose of the document, not the place where it is kept, which determines its status. 261 Iowa 216, 152 N.W.2d 833, 835 (1967). This is also the rule under the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The federal courts have uniformly held that mere possession of a document by an agency does not make it an agency record for purposes of public access under the FOIA. See, e.g., Kissinger v. Reporters Comm. for Freedom of the Press, 445 U.S. 136, 157, 100 S.Ct. 960, 972, 63 L.Ed.2d 267 (1980); Warth v. Department of Justice, 595 F.2d 521, 522 (9th Cir.1979); Goland v. CIA, 607 F.2d 339, 345-47 (D.C. Cir.1978). Thus, as the term has come to be defined, a public record must also have some relation to the official duties of the public officer that holds the record  in this case, the state treasurer. The term public record comprehends three alternative definitions in American case law, all of which this court set forth in Mathews v. Pyle, 75 Ariz. 76, 78, 251 P.2d 893, 895 (1952). The term first refers to a record made by a public officer in pursuance of a duty, the immediate purpose of which is to disseminate information to the public, or to serve as a memorial of official transactions for public reference. Id. (citation omitted). The check distribution list does not qualify under this definition because it was not made by a public officer in the pursuance of a duty. The list was made by Security, the escrow agent of the United States, in the pursuance of its private, contractual undertaking to pay the escrow funds to the allottees. A public record is also one that is required to be kept, or necessary to be kept in the discharge of a duty imposed by law or directed by law to serve as a memorial and evidence of something written, said or done. Id.; see also Smith v. Paul, 174 Cal. App.2d 744, 345 P.2d 546, 551 (1959); Olson, 232 Cal. App.2d at 486-87, 42 Cal. Rptr. at 764-65. The treasurer's duties are set forth at A.R.S. § 41-172, which provides in relevant part: A. The state treasurer shall:       6. Keep an account of all monies received and disbursed, and keep separate accounts of the different funds and appropriations of money. The funds in question here were paid out of the Security escrow account and not out of the state treasury. The check distribution list is thus an accounting of federal escrow funds, not state funds. As our February 22 order sets forth, payments by the state treasurer as part of the right-of-way transaction are part of the public record, as are all supporting documents. However, so far as this record shows, the treasurer did not have a statutory duty to keep the check distribution list, did not compile the list, did not use the list, and did not even consult it in performing his duties. Finally, the term public record comprehends any written record of transactions of a public officer in his office, which is a convenient and appropriate method of discharging his duties, and is kept by him as such, whether required by ... law or not.... Mathews, 75 Ariz. at 78, 251 P.2d at 895; People v. Purcell, 22 Cal. App.2d 126, 70 P.2d 706, 708 (1937); MacEwan v. Holm, 226 Or. 27, 359 P.2d 413, 419 (1961). Again, the check distribution list records a transaction between the United States, as trustee, and individual Indian allottees, as beneficiaries. The Secretary had the duty to pay the appropriate compensation to the allottees. Phoenix Newspapers does not assert that the treasurer had any duty to the allottees; thus, the list was neither relevant, convenient, nor appropriate to any discharge of the treasurer's duties. The list, we emphasize, is a record of a transaction between a private party, Security, and an Indian community that, as a separate sovereign entity, is largely outside the jurisdiction of Arizona's laws and court system. See Tracy, 168 Ariz. at 35-36, 810 P.2d at 1042-43. We conclude that the check distribution list does not qualify as a public record held in the treasurer's official capacity. Therefore, we turn to a determination of whether the list is an other matter within the meaning of the statute.
Other matters subject to the public's right of access include documents which are not required by law to be filed as public records, but which relate to matters essential to the general welfare of taxpayers, such for example as matters of taxation, revenue, and the proceedings for carrying out of governmental projects at public expense.... Mathews, 75 Ariz. at 79-80, 251 P.2d at 896 (quoting Runyon v. Board of Prison Terms and Paroles, 26 Cal. App.2d 183, 79 P.2d 101 (1938)). In Mathews, this court found that documents generated by the Arizona Attorney General in conjunction with an investigation of the land commissioner's office constituted other matters held by the governor, who had received the documents in his official capacity. Similarly, in Moorehead v. Arnold, the court of appeals found that annexation petitions held by the city of Tucson were other matters. 130 Ariz. 503, 505, 637 P.2d 305, 307 (Ct.App. 1981). As the California Court of Appeal noted in City Council of Santa Monica, [t]here is no precise formula by which it can be determined whether a writing is such `other matter'; it depends in each instance upon the facts of the particular case. 204 Cal. App.2d at 75, 21 Cal. Rptr. at 901. Two factors are of particular importance: whether the document is held in the official capacity of the state officer; and, if so, whether the public has a legitimate interest in the document that outweighs any governmental promise of confidentiality that has been made. See Mathews, 75 Ariz. at 80-81, 251 P.2d at 895-96. The term other matters, therefore, includes only public matters. As one commentator wrote with regard to the California statute upon which our law is based: the courts early developed a limitation to the term other matters that removed some writings found in public offices from the scope of the inspection statutes. In effect, section 1227 has been construed as referring to other public matters. Public has been defined as of, pertaining to, or affecting, the people at large or the community. The definition, therefore, does not include records that reveal only the private affairs of citizens. Comment, Inspection of Public Records Under California Law, 50 CAL.L.REV. 79, 81-82 (1962) (footnote omitted, emphasis in original). In this case, there is no evidence that the treasurer received the check distribution list in his official capacity. Because the Community failed to establish the manner in which the treasurer came into possession of a copy of the list, Phoenix Newspapers argues that we must assume the treasurer held the list in his official capacity. We are unable to make this assumption because no statute connects such a document with any state officer and because the facts of this case illustrate quite clearly that the treasurer did not compile the list, did not transact any business with the list, and did not record any official business in the list. Thus, while the facts do not establish how the treasurer came into possession of the document  whether it was accidentally left in his office or sent there by design  the facts do make it impossible to assume with any degree of probability that he held the document in his official capacity as a state officer. If anything, the facts require exactly the opposite inference. Moreover, we are not convinced that Arizona citizens have a legitimate interest in knowing the identities of Indian allottees who were paid funds out of a federal escrow account when the policy of federal and tribal law is to keep such information confidential, the state has agreed to respect that confidentiality, and the information itself is not the property of the state or its citizens. Arizona's public record contains sufficient information to determine whether the state paid fair value for the land located in the freeway right-of-way. This is the extent of Arizona's public interest. If there was fraud in distributions between the Community and the allottees or between landowners after the state funds were transferred to the United States, this is a matter for federal and tribal authorities. Arizona has no control over a disbursement of tribal or federal funds to Indian beneficiaries. In short, under the accepted definition of the term, the facts here do not support a finding that the check distribution list is an other matter held in the treasurer's official capacity.
Phoenix Newspapers claims, finally, that because ADOT paid its consultant to create the computer program used to determine the monetary amounts due the Indian landowners, the check distribution list is subject to disclosure. The argument is that because state funds were expended to assist in the disbursement of funds, the public has an interest in all aspects of the disbursement. The Community admits that [a]lthough the distribution of the ADOT payment to allotted landowners was a duty of the United States, ADOT contributed services to facilitate and hasten the process. Particularly, ADOT developed a computer program to calculate the amounts to be paid to each allotted landowner. Petition at 4. As we noted in Carlson, the 1975 amendments to the public records law broadened the category of matters to which the public right of inspection applies. 141 Ariz. at 489, 687 P.2d at 1244. A.R.S. § 39-121.01(B) requires public officers to maintain all records reasonably necessary or appropriate to maintain an accurate knowledge of their official activities and of any of their activities which are supported by funds from the state or any political subdivision thereof. Id. (citing § 39-121.01(B)). Thus, Phoenix Newspapers argues, the check distribution list must be disclosed because it is held by the treasurer to maintain an accurate knowledge of ADOT's expenditure of state funds. We find this argument unpersuasive. ADOT was required to pay fair value for the parcels within the freeway right-of-way. Fair value is a function of the size and location of the land parcels involved; the allottees' names were irrelevant to the determination. The list is neither a record maintained by a public officer nor a record of or pertaining to a public officer's activities. While records pertaining to the expenditure of state funds to purchase private property qualify as other matters, this does not mean that the seller's private records pertaining to his use of the funds paid by the state come within the public records law just because a copy inexplicably turns up in the hands of a public officer. Nor do we believe that state funding for the private computer program put the program in the public domain. We have found no case under a state public records statute that addresses the effect of funding on the status of a record. We therefore turn for guidance to federal cases that have considered the analogous issue under the FOIA. See Church of Scientology, 122 Ariz. at 340, 594 P.2d at 1036 (FOIA offers some guidance to Arizona courts in construing Arizona public records statute). In Forsham v. Harris, a private group of physicians and scientists developed data while conducting studies of diabetes treatment. 445 U.S. 169, 171, 100 S.Ct. 977, 980, 63 L.Ed.2d 293 (1980). The research was funded by a federal agency that also had authority to obtain the data. The data formed the basis of published reports that the Food and Drug Administration relied on in taking certain actions. The issue was whether federal funding in conjunction with the federal right of access rendered the data an agency record for purposes of the FOIA. The Supreme Court held that these facts were not sufficient to create an agency record because the federal agency did not control the documents. Id. at 182, 100 S.Ct. at 985; see also Ciba-Geigy Corp. v. Mathews, 428 F. Supp. 523, 532 (S.D.N.Y. 1977) (Because there has not been an adequate showing that the underlying [substantially federally-funded] data of the researchers was directly controlled or substantially utilized by a government agency in the performance of governmental operations, the records cannot be deemed `agency records' for purposes of disclosure under the FOIA.). Of course, Forsham and Ciba-Geigy were decided under the FOIA, not under the Arizona statute. However both the FOIA and our statute seek to make government agencies accountable to the public by giving the public a right of access to records concerning an agency's activities. Conversely, the public has no right of access to private records located in government offices that have no relation to the agency's activities. To the contrary, as the United States Supreme Court has commented: the FOIA's central purpose is to ensure that the Government's activities be opened to the sharp eye of public scrutiny, not that information about private citizens that happens to be in the warehouse of the Government be so disclosed. United States Dep't of Justice v. Reporters Comm. for Freedom of Press, 489 U.S. 749, 774, 109 S.Ct. 1468, 1482, 103 L.Ed.2d 774 (1989); cf. Industrial Comm'n v. Holohan, 97 Ariz. 122, 126, 397 P.2d 624, 627 (1964) (information in Commission's file that is not collected to serve as a memorial of an official transaction or for the dissemination of information is private ... [and] is protected from the prying of unauthorized individuals to the same extent as the records of a private person). The above cases establish that the public does not have a right to demand access unless the record has a substantial nexus to the agency's activities. We must therefore determine whether there is a nexus between the treasurer's office and the check distribution list.
The federal courts have uniformly held that an agency must control a record before it is subject to disclosure under the FOIA. See, e.g., United States Dep't of Justice v. Tax Analysts, 492 U.S. 136, 145-46, 109 S.Ct. 2841, 2847-48, 106 L.Ed.2d 112 (1989); Kissinger, 445 U.S. at 151-52, 100 S.Ct. at 969; Wolfe v. Department of Health & Human Servs., 711 F.2d 1077, 1079-80 (D.C. Cir.1983); National Sec. Archive v. Executive Office of the President, 688 F. Supp. 29, 32 (D.D.C. 1988), aff'd, 909 F.2d 541 (D.C. Cir.1990) (agency to whom FOIA request is directed must generally have exclusive control of the disputed documents). When one agency transfers the document to another, the receiving agency must also exert control over the document before disclosure can be compelled. See Ciba-Geigy, 428 F. Supp. at 532 (analysis of control remains the critical inquiry when there has been a transfer of the records in question.). The control test is helpful in analyzing our statute, which also exempts private information from disclosure even when it is held by a government agency. An agency has control over the documents when they have come into the agency's possession in the legitimate conduct of its official duties. Tax Analysts, 492 U.S. at 145, 109 S.Ct. at 2848. Thus, mere physical possession is not sufficient to impart control. Kissinger, 445 U.S. at 151, 100 S.Ct. at 969. In Kissinger, the Court considered whether certain notes of Kissinger's private telephone conversations, which were taken to his office at the State Department, were agency records by virtue of the fact that they were located in the offices of a government agency. The Court concluded: We simply decline to hold that the physical location of the notes of telephone conversations renders them agency records. The papers were not in the control of the State Department at any time. They were not generated in the State Department. They never entered the State Department's files and they were not used by the Department for any purpose. If mere physical location of papers and materials could confer status as an agency record Kissinger's personal books, speeches, and all other memorabilia stored in his office would have been agency records subject to disclosure under the FOIA. 445 U.S. at 157, 100 S.Ct. at 972 (citing Forsham, 445 U.S. 169, 100 S.Ct. 977). In Kissinger, the Court found that the agency did not have the requisite control because it neither generated the document nor used the document for an agency purpose. Id.; see also Tax Analysts v. United States Dep't of Justice, 845 F.2d 1060, 1068 (D.C. Cir.1988), aff'd, 492 U.S. 136, 109 S.Ct. 2841, 106 L.Ed.2d 112 (1989) (Agencies must use or rely on the document to perform business, and integrate it into their files, before it may be deemed an `agency record.'). As we have noted above, the record in this case does not show that the treasurer generated the list or used it in the course of his official duties. An agency's mere possession of private information does not make that information subject to disclosure under A.R.S. § 39-121.