FOIL-AO-14170

August 6, 2003

The staff of the Committee on Open Government is authorized to issue advisory opinions. The ensuing staff advisory opinion is based solely upon the information presented in your correspondence.

Dear

I have received your letter in which you described a series of difficulties and sought assistance in relation to your efforts in obtaining copies of oaths of office of judges from county clerks.

Since I am not an expert on the subject of oaths of office, I sought to research the matter and found direction in §10 of the Public Officers Law. As I understand that provision, not all of the oaths of office in which you are interested are necessarily filed with a county clerk. Section 10 provides in relevant part that:

"Every officer shall take and file the oath of office required by law, and every judicial officer of the unified court system, in addition, shall file a copy of said oath in the office of court administration, before he shall be entitled to enter upon the discharge of any of his official duties....The oath of office of every state officer shall be filed in the office of the secretary of state; of every officer of a municipal corporation, including a school district, with the clerk thereof; and of every other officer....in the office of the clerk of the county in which he shall reside, if no place be otherwise provided by law for the filing thereof."

Insofar as a county clerk or any other state or municipal office or officer maintains the records of your interest, I believe that they must be disclosed. In brief, the Freedom of Information Law is based upon a presumption of access. Stated differently, all records of an agency are available, except to the extent that records or portions thereof fall within one or more grounds for denial appearing in §87(2)(a) through (i) of the Law. From my perspective, none of the grounds for denial of access would be applicable when an agency maintains oaths of office.

In a situation in which an agency indicates that it does not maintain or cannot locate a record, an applicant for the record may seek a certification to that effect. Section 89(3) of the Freedom of Information Law provides in part that, in such a situation, on request, an agency "shall certify that it does not have possession of such record or that such record cannot be found after diligent search." If you consider it worthwhile to do so, you could seek such a certification.

Lastly, the Freedom of Information Law provides direction concerning the time and manner in which agencies must respond to requests for records. Specifically, §89(3) of the Freedom of Information Law states in part that:

"Each entity subject to the provisions of this article, within five business days of the receipt of a written request for a record reasonably described, shall make such record available to the person requesting it, deny such request in writing or furnish a written acknowledgement of the receipt of such request and a statement of the approximate date when such request will be granted or denied..."

If neither a response to a request nor an acknowledgement of the receipt of a request is given within five business days, or if an agency delays responding for an unreasonable time after it acknowledges that a request has been received, a request may, in my opinion, be considered to have been constructively denied [see DeCorse v. City of Buffalo, 239 AD2d 949, 950 (1997)]. In such a circumstance, I believe that the denial may be appealed in accordance with §89(4)(a) of the Freedom of Information Law. That provision states in relevant part that:

"...any person denied access to a record may within thirty days appeal in writing such denial to the head, chief executive, or governing body, who shall within ten business days of the receipt of such appeal fully explain in writing to the person requesting the record the reasons for further denial, or provide access to the record sought."

In addition, it has been held that when an appeal is made but a determination is not rendered within ten business days of the receipt of the appeal as required under §89(4)(a) of the Freedom of Information Law, the appellant has exhausted his or her administrative remedies and may initiate a challenge to a constructive denial of access under Article 78 of the Civil Practice Law and Rules [Floyd v. McGuire, 87 AD2d 388, appeal dismissed 57 NY2d 774 (1982)].

I hope that I have been of assistance.

Sincerely,

 

Robert J. Freeman
Executive Director

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