April 3, 2012

Mr. Mark G. Mann

Assistant City Attorney

City of Garland

P.O. Box 469002

Garland, Texas 75046-9002

OR2012-04789

Dear Mr. Mann:

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# 449499 (GCA 12-0014).

The City of Garland (the "city") received a request for a list of customers that Garland Power and Light provides service to, including customer names, addresses, zip codes, phone numbers, and email addresses. You claim the submitted information is excepted from disclosure under section 552.133 of the Government Code. We have considered the exception you claim and reviewed the submitted representative sample of information. ⁽¹⁾

Section 552.133 of the Government Code excepts from disclosure a public power utility's information that is "reasonably related to a competitive matter." Gov't Code § 552.133(b). The Texas Legislature recently amended section 552.133, which now provides in relevant part:

(a) In this section, "public power utility" means an entity providing electric or gas utility services that is subject to the provisions of this chapter.

(a-1) For purposes of this section, "competitive matter" means a utility-related matter that is related to the public power utility's competitive activity, including commercial information, and would, if disclosed, give advantage to competitors or prospective competitors. The term:

(1) means a matter that is reasonably related to the following categories of information:

. . .

(F) customer billing, contract, and usage information, electric power pricing information, system load characteristics, and electric power marketing analyses and strategies[.]

Id. § 552.133(a)-(a-1). Section 552.133(a-1)(2) provides fifteen categories of information that are not competitive matters. Id. § 552.133(a-1)(2).

You inform us the city is a municipality which owns and operates its own electric utility, which is a "public power utility" under section 552.133(a). You state the requested information is used by the city to better provide utility services and facilitate customer billing and communication. The requested information is not among the fifteen categories of information expressly excluded from the definition of "competitive matter" by section 552.133(a-1)(2). Based on your assertions, we find the requested information relates to a competitive matter as defined under section 552.133(a-1). Thus, we conclude the requested information is excepted from disclosure under section 552.133 of the Government Code and must be withheld from the requestor on this basis.

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,

Michelle R. Garza

Assistant Attorney General

Open Records Division

MRG/em

Ref: ID# 449499

Enc. Submitted documents

c: Requestor

(w/o enclosures)

Footnotes

1. We assume 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 those records contain substantially different types of information than those submitted to this office.

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