May 5, 2011

Ms. Sharon Alexander

Associate General Counsel

Texas Department of Transportation

125 East 11^th Street

Austin, Texas 78701-2483

OR2011-06216

Dear Ms. Alexander:

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# 416474.

The Texas Department of Transportation (the "department") received a request for information pertaining to a traffic accident. ⁽¹⁾ You claim that the submitted information is excepted from disclosure under section 552.101 of the Government Code. We have considered the exception you claim and reviewed the submitted information.

Section 552.101 excepts from disclosure "information considered to be confidential by law, either constitutional, statutory, or by judicial decision." Gov't Code § 552.101. Section 552.101 encompasses information that other statutes make confidential. The submitted information consists of a CRB-3 crash report completed pursuant to chapter 550 of the Transportation Code. See Transp. Code § 550.064 (officer's accident report). Section 550.065(b) of the Transportation Code states that, except as provided by subsection (c) or subsection (e), accident reports are privileged and confidential. See id. § 550.065. Section 550.065(c)(4) provides for the release of accident reports to a person who provides two of the following three items of information: (1) the date of the accident; (2) the name of any person involved in the accident; and (3) the specific location of the accident. See id. § 550.065(c)(4). Under this provision, the department or another governmental entity is required to release a copy of an accident report to a person who provides the agency with two or more of the items of information specified by the statute. Id. In this instance, the requestor has not provided the department with any of the required pieces of information. Thus, the department must withhold the submitted information from the requestor under section 552.101 of the Government Code in conjunction with section 550.065(b) of the Transportation Code.

This letter ruling is limited to the particular information 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 information or any other circumstances.

This ruling triggers important deadlines regarding the rights and responsibilities of the governmental body and of the requestor. For more information concerning those rights and responsibilities, please visit our website at http://www.oag.state.tx.us/open/index_orl.php, or call the Office of the Attorney General's Open Government Hotline, toll free, at (877) 673-6839. Questions concerning the allowable charges for providing public information under the Act must be directed to the Cost Rules Administrator of the Office of the Attorney General, toll free, at (888) 672-6787.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Miles

Assistant Attorney General

Open Records Division

JM/em

Ref: ID# 416474

Enc. Submitted documents

c: Requestor

(w/o enclosures)

Footnotes

1. We note the department sought clarification from the requestor. See Gov't Code § 552.222(b) (stating if information requested is unclear to governmental body or of large amount of information has been requested, governmental body may ask requestor to clarify or narrow request, but may not inquire into purpose for which information will be used).

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