City of Plattsburg, MO Public Access to Records of City

Legal actions, causes of action or litigation involving a public governmental body and any confidential or privileged communications between a public governmental body or its representatives and its attorneys. However, any minutes, vote or settlement agreement relating to legal actions, causes of action or litigation involving a public governmental body or any agent or entity representing its interests or acting on its behalf or with its authority, including any insurance company acting on behalf of a public government body as its insured, shall be made public upon final disposition of the matter voted upon or upon the signing by the parties of the settlement agreement, unless, prior to final disposition, the settlement agreement is ordered closed by a court after a written finding that the adverse impact to a plaintiff or plaintiffs to the action clearly outweighs the public policy considerations of Section 610.010, RSMo., however, the amount of any monies paid by, or on behalf of, the public governmental body shall be disclosed; provided however, in matters involving the exercise of the power of eminent domain, the vote shall be announced or become public immediately following the action on the motion to authorize institution of such a legal action. Legal work product shall be considered a closed record;

Leasing, purchase or sale of real estate by a public governmental body where public knowledge of the transaction might adversely affect the legal consideration therefor. However, any minutes, vote or public record approving a contract relating to the leasing, purchase or sale of real estate by a public governmental body shall be made public upon execution of the lease, purchase or sale of the real estate;

Hiring, firing, disciplining or promoting of particular employees by a public governmental body when personal information about the employee is discussed or recorded. However, any vote on a final decision, when taken by a public governmental body, to hire, fire, promote or discipline an employee of a public governmental body shall be made available with a record of how each member voted to the public within seventy-two (72) hours of the close of the meeting where such action occurs; provided however, that any employee so affected shall be entitled to prompt notice of such decision during the seventy-two (72) hour period before such decision is made available to the public. As used in this Subdivision, the term "personal information" means information relating to the performance or merit of individual employees;

Preparation, including any discussions or work product, on behalf of a public governmental body or its representatives for negotiations with employee groups;

Software codes for electronic data processing and documentation thereof;

Specifications for competitive bidding, until either the specifications are officially approved by the public governmental body or the specifications are published for bid;

Sealed bids and related documents, until the bids are opened; and sealed proposals and related documents or any documents related to a negotiated contract until a contract is executed or all proposals are rejected;

Individually identifiable personnel records, performance ratings or records pertaining to employees or applicants for employment, except that this exemption shall not apply to the names, positions, salaries and lengths of service of officers and employees of public agencies once they are employed as such and the names of private sources donating or contributing money to the salary of a chancellor or president at all public colleges and universities in the state of Missouri and the amount of money contributed by the source;

Records which are protected from disclosure by law;

10.

Confidential or privileged communications between a public governmental body and its auditor, including all auditor work product; however, all final audit reports issued by the auditor are to be considered open records pursuant to this Chapter;

11.

Operational guidelines and policies developed, adopted or maintained by any public agency responsible for law enforcement, public safety, first response or public health for use in responding to or preventing any critical incident which is or appears to be terrorist in nature and which has the potential to endanger individual or public safety or health. Nothing in this exception shall be deemed to close information regarding expenditures, purchases or contracts made by an agency in implementing these guidelines or policies. When seeking to close information pursuant to this exception, the agency shall affirmatively state in writing that disclosure would impair its ability to protect the safety or health of persons and shall in the same writing state that the public interest in non-disclosure outweighs the public interest in disclosure of the records. This exception shall sunset on December 31, 2008;

12.

Existing or proposed security systems and structural plans of real property owned or leased by a public governmental body and information that is voluntarily submitted by a non-public entity owning or operating an infrastructure to any public governmental body for use by that body to devise plans for protection of that infrastructure, the public disclosure of which would threaten public safety:

Records related to the procurement of or expenditures relating to security systems purchased with public funds shall be open;

When seeking to close information pursuant to this exception, the disclosure would impair the public governmental body's ability to protect the security or safety of persons or real property and shall in the same writing state that the public interest in non-disclosure outweighs the public interest in disclosure of the records;

Records that are voluntarily submitted by a non-public entity shall be reviewed by the receiving agency within ninety (90) days of submission to determine if retention of the document is necessary in furtherance of a State security interest. If retention is not necessary, the documents shall be returned to the non-public governmental body or destroyed;

This exception shall sunset on December 31, 2008;

13.

Records that identify the configuration of components or the operation of a computer, computer system, computer network or telecommunications network and would allow unauthorized access to or unlawful disruption of a computer, computer system, computer network or telecommunications network of a public governmental body. This exception shall not be used to limit or deny access to otherwise public records in a file, document, data file or database containing public records. Records related to the procurement of or expenditures relating to such computer, computer system, computer network or telecommunications network, including the amount of monies paid by or on behalf of a public governmental body for such computer, computer system, computer network or telecommunications network, shall be open; and

14.

Credit card numbers, personal identification numbers, digital certificates, physical and virtual keys, access codes or authorization codes that are used to protect the security of electronic transactions between a public governmental body and a person or entity doing business with a public governmental body. Nothing in this Section shall be deemed to close the record of a person or entity using a credit card held in the name of a public governmental body or any record of a transaction made by a person using a credit card or other method of payment for which reimbursement is made by a public governmental body.

Section 150.020 Location of Records — Removal From Premises.

[Ord. No. 1389 §2, 10-11-1999]

Public records of the City will generally be stored and maintained at City Hall. The City Administrator is authorized to arrange for off-site storage of City records as the needs of the City and the volume of records may require. No person, including any employee of the City, shall remove original public records from City Hall without first obtaining the written permission of the Records Custodian. During any public inspection of an original record, the Records Custodian or a designated employee of the City shall be continuously present to assure that such document is not altered, damaged, destroyed or removed.

Section 150.030 Response to Request for Records.

[Ord. No. 1389 §3, 10-11-1999; Ord. No. 1690 §2, 8-18-2004]

The custodian of records shall respond to requests for access to or copies of public records within the time period provided by Statute except in those circumstances authorized by Statute.

Section 150.040 Denial of Request.

[Ord. No. 1389 §4, 10-11-1999]

It is the duty of the Records Custodian to review every request for public records of the City to determine whether the documents requested should be exempt from disclosure. Documents of the City shall not be publicly disclosed if they contain attorney/client privileged communications, attorney work product, confidential information concerning City personnel (including an employee's social security number, medical records, and/or disciplinary records), information subject to the Deliberative Process Privilege, or information exempt from disclosure pursuant to other laws. If the Records Custodian determines that a request may be subject to denial, the Records Custodian shall immediately confer with the City Attorney to determine whether all or any portion of the request should be denied. If a request for access is denied, the Records Custodian (or the City Attorney at the direction of the Records Custodian) shall provide, upon request, a written statement of the grounds for such denial. Such statement shall cite the specific provision of law under which access is denied and shall be furnished to the requester no later than the end of the third (3rd) business day following the date that the request for the statement is received.

Section 150.050 Records Containing Exempt and Non-Exempt Materials.

[Ord. No. 1389 §5, 10-11-1999]

If a City record contains material which is not exempt from disclosure as well as material which is exempt from disclosure, the Records Custodian shall separate the exempt and non-exempt material and make the non-exempt material available for examination and copying. If portions of a document are withheld from disclosure, the Records Custodian shall provide a general written description of the redacted material, unless that description would reveal the contents of the exempt information and thus defeat the purpose of the exemption.

Section 150.060 Fee Schedule.

[Ord. No. 1389 §6, 10-11-1999; Ord. No. 1690 §3, 8-18-2004]

Fees to be charged for access to or furnishing copies of records shall be as hereinafter provided:

The actual duplicating time required to duplicate the records shall be charged to the requestor at a rate not to exceed the average hourly rate of pay for clerical staff of the City. Research time required for fulfilling records requests may be charged at the actual cost of research time.

Copies of records shall be ten cents ($0.10) per page for a paper copy not larger than nine (9) by fourteen (14) inches.

Fees for providing access to public records maintained on computer facilities, recording tapes or disks, videotapes or films, pictures, maps, slides, graphics, illustrations or similar audio or visual items or devices and for paper copies larger than nine (9) by fourteen (14) inches shall include only the cost of copies, staff time, which shall not exceed the average hourly rate of pay for staff of the City required for making copies and programming, if necessary, and the cost of the disk, tape or other medium used for the duplication. Fees for maps, blueprints or plats that require special expertise to duplicate shall include the actual rate of compensation for the trained personnel required to duplicate such maps, blueprints or plats. If programming is required beyond the customary and usual level to comply with a request for records or information, the fees for compliance shall include the actual cost of such programming.

Prior to producing copies of the requested records, the person requesting the records may request the City to provide an estimate of the cost to the person requesting the records. The City may require advance payment for requests involving research and high volume copying.

Section 150.070 Requests in Connection With Pending Litigation.

[Ord. No. 1389 §7, 10-11-1999]

In matters of litigation involving the City where legal discovery is involved through the use of subpoenas, interrogatories, requests for production, or other similar requests, the provisions of this Policy shall be inapplicable and the City Attorney shall supervise the discovery process.

Section 150.080 Further Rules Authorized.

[Ord. No. 1389 §8, 10-11-1999]

Consistent with the intent and purpose of this policy, the Records Custodian is authorized to promulgate such other rules or procedures as may become necessary or appropriate to facilitate the orderly and efficient production of documents and records to the public and to preserve the availability and accuracy of original public records. All such rules or procedures shall be reduced to writing, approved by the City Administrator, and a copy of same shall be made available to any person upon request.