 ATTORNEY GENERAL OF TEXAS GREG ABBOTT | |
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March 27, 2007 Mr. James G. Nolan OR2007-03341 Dear Mr. Nolan: You ask whether certain information is subject to required public disclosure under the Public Information Act (the "Act"), chapter 552 of the Government Code. Your request was assigned ID#275308. The Comptroller of Public Accounts (the "comptroller") received a request for multiple categories of information relating to the annual property value study pertaining to the Houston Independent School District. You state that some of the requested information will be released to the requestor. You claim that the requested information is excepted from disclosure under section 552.101 of the Government Code. You also indicate that releasing the requested information may implicate the interests of a third party. Accordingly, you have notified the interested third party, CoStar Realty Information, Inc. ("CoStar"), of the request and of its opportunity to submit comments to this office. See Gov't Code § 552.305(d); Open Records Decision No. 542 (1990) (statutory predecessor to section 552.305 allows a governmental body to rely on an interested third party to raise and explain the applicability of the exception to disclosure in certain circumstances). We have received arguments from CoStar. We have considered all of the submitted exceptions and reviewed the submitted representative sample of information. (1) Section 552.101 of the Government Code excepts from disclosure "information considered to be confidential by law, either constitutional, statutory, or by judicial decision." Gov't Code § 552.101. This section encompasses information protected by other statutes. Section 403.304 of the Government Code provides: (a) All information the comptroller obtains from a person, other than a government or governmental subdivision or agency, under an assurance that the information will be kept confidential, in the course of conducting a study of school district values is confidential and may not be disclosed except as provided in Subsection (b). (b) Information made confidential by this section may be disclosed: (1) in a judicial or administrative proceeding pursuant to a lawful subpoena; (2) to the person who gave the information to the comptroller; or (3) for statistical purposes if in a form that does not identify specific property or a specific property owner. Gov't. Code § 403.304. You inform us that the information at issue pertains to commercial real estate sales and valuation information obtained from CoStar, a non-governmental entity. You state that the information was obtained in the course of conducting the comptroller's Annual Property Value Survey, a study required under section 403.302 of the Government Code that evaluates school district property values. See Gov't. Code § 403.302. You inform us that the information was obtained under an assurance that the information will be kept confidential by the comptroller. You also state that none of the exceptions to confidentiality set forth in subsection 403.304(b) apply in this instance. Based on your representations and our review, we agree that the submitted information must be withheld under section 552.101 in conjunction with section 403.304(a) of the Government Code. As we are able to reach this conclusion, we do not address any of the remaining arguments. This letter ruling is limited to the particular records at issue in this request and limited to the facts as presented to us; therefore, this ruling must not be relied upon as a previous determination regarding any other records or any other circumstances. This ruling triggers important deadlines regarding the rights and responsibilities of the governmental body and of the requestor. For example, governmental bodies are prohibited from asking the attorney general to reconsider this ruling. Gov't Code § 552.301(f). If the governmental body wants to challenge this ruling, the governmental body must appeal by filing suit in Travis County within 30 calendar days. Id. § 552.324(b). In order to get the full benefit of such an appeal, the governmental body must file suit within 10 calendar days. Id. § 552.353(b)(3), (c). If the governmental body does not appeal this ruling and the governmental body does not comply with it, then both the requestor and the attorney general have the right to file suit against the governmental body to enforce this ruling. Id. § 552.321(a). If this ruling requires the governmental body to release all or part of the requested information, the governmental body is responsible for taking the next step. Based on the statute, the attorney general expects that, upon receiving this ruling, the governmental body will either release the public records promptly pursuant to section 552.221(a) of the Government Code or file a lawsuit challenging this ruling pursuant to section 552.324 of the Government Code. If the governmental body fails to do one of these things, then the requestor should report that failure to the attorney general's Open Government Hotline, toll free, at (877) 673-6839. The requestor may also file a complaint with the district or county attorney. Id. § 552.3215(e). If this ruling requires or permits the governmental body to withhold all or some of the requested information, the requestor can appeal that decision by suing the governmental body. Id. § 552.321(a); Texas Dep't of Pub. Safety v. Gilbreath, 842 S.W.2d 408, 411 (Tex. App.--Austin 1992, no writ). Please remember that under the Act the release of information triggers certain procedures for costs and charges to the requestor. If records are released in compliance with this ruling, be sure that all charges for the information are at or below the legal amounts. Questions or complaints about over-charging must be directed to Hadassah Schloss at the Office of the Attorney General at (512) 475-2497. If the governmental body, the requestor, or any other person has questions or comments about this ruling, they may contact our office. Although there is no statutory deadline for contacting us, the attorney general prefers to receive any comments within 10 calendar days of the date of this ruling. Sincerely, Debbie K. Lee Assistant Attorney General Open Records Division DKL/eb Ref: ID# 275308 Enc. Submitted documents c: Dr. Rostam M. Kavoussi 711 Navarro Street, Suite 309 San Antonio, Texas 78205-9722 (w/o enclosures) Mr. Scott A. Zebrak Deputy General Counsel CoStar Group, Inc. 2 Bethesda Metro Center, 10th Floor Bethesda, Maryland 20814-5388 (w/o enclosures)
1. We assume that the "representative sample" of records submitted to this office is truly representative
of the requested records as a whole. See Open Records Decision Nos. 499 (1988), 497 (1988). This open
records letter does not reach, and therefore does not authorize the withholding of, any other requested records
to the extent that those records contain substantially different types of information than that submitted to this
office. POST OFFICE BOX 12548, AUSTIN, TEXAS 78711-2548 TEL: (512) 463-2100 WEB: WWW.OAG.STATE.TX.US |