Request By:
[NO REQUESTBY IN ORIGINAL]
Opinion
Opinion By: A. B. Chandler III, Attorney General; Amye L. Bensenhaver, Assistant Attorney General
Open Records Decision
This is an appeal from the Personnel Cabinet's partial denial of the Kentucky Association of State Employee's October 2, 1997, request for "a report containing the names of all employees, as of August 31, 1997, at the Kentucky Veterans Center, their city and county of residence, their job title, and their overtime salary compensation status." In a handwritten note dated October 3, 1997, Daniel F. Egbers responded to KASE's request on behalf of the Cabinet. Although the Cabinet released the names of the employees, their job titles, and their overtime salary compensation status, it refused to disclose the employees' city and county of residence, arguing that this information "is part of their address which is private information under KRS 61.878(1)(a)." In his letter of appeal, KASE's attorney, C. David Emerson, counters that his client did not request home addresses. He observes:
[KASE's] record request only asks for information pertaining to the employees' "city and county of residence," which is much broader in scope than just the home address. The fact of an employees' county of residence is not so private as to constitute "a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy [.]"
It is KASE's position that the county of residence "is not personal to the employee like home address would be."
We are asked to determine if the Personnel Cabinet properly relied on KRS 61.878(1)(a) in partially denying KASE's request. Because disclosure of the city and county of residence of employees of the Kentucky Veterans Center "would not in any real way subject agency action to public scrutiny, " Zink v. Commonwealth of Kentucky, Ky.App., 902 S.W.2d 825, 829 (1994), we find that the Cabinet properly withheld this information.
KRS 61.878(1)(a) authorizes public agencies to withhold:
Public records containing information of a personal nature where the public disclosure thereof would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.
In determining whether the city and county of residence of Veterans Center employees qualifies for exclusion under this provision, we must first decide if the disputed information is of a personal nature.
This office has long recognized that a public employee's home address is information of a personal nature. OAG 76-717; OAG 79-275; OAG 84-51; OAG 84-166; OAG 87-37; OAG 87-84; OAG 89-90; OAG 90-60; OAG 91-81. Thus, we have stated that although the public is entitled to know the name, position, work station, and salary of a public employee, that employee is entitled to privacy in his personal life and off-duty activities. This right to privacy extends to the public employee's home address. As we observed in OAG 87-37:
While the public has a right to know about that which is related to the governmental employee's public and work related activities, his home address normally would be unrelated to his official job activities.
OAG 87-37, p. 4. The Kentucky Court of Appeals has also recognized the personal nature of an individual's home address. Quoting liberally from the Sixth Circuit's decision in Heights Community Congress v. Veterans Administration, 732 F.2d 526, 529 (6th Cir. 1984), the Zink court opined:
"There are few things which pertain to an individual in which his privacy has traditionally been more respected than his own home. (Citation omitted.) The importance of the right to privacy in one's address is evidenced by the acceptance within society of unlisted telephone numbers, by which subscribers may avoid publication of an address in the public directory, and postal boxes, which permit the receipt of mail without disclosing the location of one's residence. These current manifestations of the ancient maxim that 'a man's home is his castle' (citation omitted) support the . . . important privacy interest in the addresses sought." [Citation omitted.] Similarly, many individuals choose to disseminate their home telephone numbers only on a selected basis. We, too, are hesitant to denigrate the sanctity of the home, that place in which an individual's privacy has long been steadfastly recognized by our laws and customs. One of our most time-honored rights is the right to be left alone. . . .
See also, 95-ORD-151.
As Mr. Emerson correctly notes, KASE did not ask for the employees' home addresses. Rather, KASE requested access to their city and county of residence, and this information, in his view, "is not personal to the employee like home address would be." While we acknowledge that a public employee's city and county of residence, standing alone, is sufficiently attenuated from his or her home address as to be substantially less personal, we nevertheless believe that the employee has at least some expectation of privacy in this information. It is, after all, part and parcel of his or her home address, and can be used to more expeditiously determine that address through such sources as a telephone directory or voter registration list. Thus, the privacy interest of public employees in their city and county of residence is less significant than their privacy interest in home addresses, but cannot be entirely discounted.
Having determined that the disputed information is of a personal nature, "we proceed to determine whether . . . an invasion of privacy is warranted by weighing the public interest in disclosure against the privacy interests involved." Zink at 828. In Zink , the Court of Appeals concluded "that the only relevant public interest in disclosure to be considered is the extent to which disclosure would serve the principle purpose of the Open Records Act." Id. Expounding on this view, the court observed:
At its most basic level, the purpose of disclosure focuses on the citizens' right to be informed as to what their government is doing . . . [and thus to] subject agency action to public scrutiny.
Id. at 829. Because KASE has not explained how disclosure of Veterans Center employees' city and county of residence will in any way further the purpose for which the Open Records Law was enacted, we find that there is no public interest supporting disclosure.
The public can learn nothing about the operations of the Kentucky Veterans Center by knowing the city and county of residence of its employees. KRS 36.355 provides for the establishment of a state veteran's nursing home "to provide domiciliary or nursing home care to veterans who are residents of Kentucky." Records pertaining to the Veterans Center's functions, activities, programs, and operations are clearly of a public nature. KRS 61.870(2). Records pertaining to the Center's employees' city and county of residence reveal nothing about its functions, activities, programs, and operations. The law does not require that those employees reside in specific locations or reflect a particular demographic composition. Disclosure of this information would do nothing to further the public's right to know how the Veterans Center conducts its business.
Although KASE maintains that its purpose in securing this information is to conduct a demographic study of the Center's employees, we remind the parties that "our analysis does not turn on the purposes for which the request for information is made or the identity of the person making the request . . . [since] the Legislature clearly intended to grant any member of the public as much right to access to information as the next." Zink at 828. Disclosure to KASE would mean disclosure to "commercial advertisers and solicitors, as well as the merely curious." Id. at 829. However laudatory KASE's purpose, there is no public interest in release of the Center's employees' city and county of residence. We therefore conclude that the employees' privacy interest, insignificant as it may be, is superior to the nonexistent public interest in disclosure. The Cabinet properly withheld this information pursuant to KRS 61.878(1)(a).
A party aggrieved by this decision may appeal it by initiating action in the appropriate circuit court pursuant to KRS 61.880(5) and KRS 61.882. Pursuant to KRS 61.880(3), the Attorney General should be notified of any action in circuit court, but should not be named as a party in that action or in any subsequent proceeding.