Office of the Governor v. Donahue, Office of Open Records
Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania
No. 376 M.D. 2012
January 23, 2013
The Commonwealth Court declared that an agency must respond to a Right to Know Law (“RTKL”) request within five business days of the date the agency’s open records officer actually receives the request, not the date it is first received by the agency.
Background
The Office of the Governor asked the Commonwealth Court to clarify the deadline for agencies to respond to RTKL requests after getting an adverse ruling from the Office of Open Records (“OOR”) in a case involving a request from a citizen named Sean Donahue.
In that case, the Governor’s Office responded five days after its open records officer received Donahue’s request, which was several days after the request was received by another employee in the Office.
The OOR held that Donahue’s request was deemed denied because the Governor’s Office did not respond within five days of the time it first received the request.
Commonwealth Court Decision
On appeal the Commonwealth Court considered whether the five-business day response time for a RTKL request begins when an agency receives the request or when the request is actually received by the agency’s open records officer.
The court explained that the RTKL’s plain language provides that “[t]he time for response [to a request] shall not exceed five business days from the date the written request is received by the open-records officer for an agency.”
Therefore, the court concluded that “once the open-records officer for an agency, not any agency employee, receives a written request for records, the agency has five business days to respond to the request.”
▪ January 23, 2013 – Commonwealth Court Opinion – No. 376 C.D. 2012