You are here: / / THE PURPOSE OF PETITIONER’S REQUEST FOR CONTACT INFORMATION ABOUT...

THE PURPOSE OF PETITIONER’S REQUEST FOR CONTACT INFORMATION ABOUT EACH COUNTY EMPLOYEE WAS TO CONVINCE THE EMPLOYEES TO OPT OUT OF JOINING A UNION; NO GOVERNMENTAL PURPOSE WOULD BE SERVED BY PUBLIC DISCLOSURE OF THE INFORMATION; THE FOIL PRIVACY EXEMPTION APPLIES (FOURTH DEPT).

The Fourth Department, reversing Supreme Court, determined the privacy provisions in the Public Officers Law shielded the county from the petitioner’s request for information about each employee. “With respect to each employee, petitioner sought the employee’s first name, middle name, last name, gender, public office address, job title, hire date, agency or department, work email address “or naming convention and domain,” work telephone number, and bargaining unit. In addition, petitioner sought “to receive the responsive information electronically in machine-readable format.” The Fourth Department found that the request was made to facilitate petitioner’s campaign to prevent county employees from joining a union:

It is evident here that petitioner’s intent, which “drives [our] analysis” … , in requesting the employees’ names, contact information, and union status, is to contact union members to urge them to opt out of union membership. Indeed, petitioner states in its brief on appeal that it “contacts public employees for the purposes of its educational mission through . . . a project” that it calls ” ‘Opt-Out Today.’ ” There is no indication that petitioner “intends to use the names to, for example, expose governmental abuses or evaluate governmental activities” … . Nor, as petitioner asserts, does the “natural and obvious meaning” we assign to the term “solicitation” conflict “with the legislative intent and . . . general purpose and manifest policy underlying FOIL” … . “If anything, it is precisely because no governmental purpose is served by public disclosure of this information that section 87 (2) (b)’s privacy exemption falls squarely within FOIL’s statutory scheme” … . Matter of Freedom Found. v Jefferson County, 2024 NY Slip Op 03944, Fourth Dept 7-26-24

Practice Point: Here the disclosure of contact information for county employees did not serve a governmental purpose and was prohibited by FOIL’s privacy exemption.

 

You might also like
DEFENSE COUNSEL INEFFECTIVE FOR FAILING TO OBJECT TO PROSECUTOR’S EXAGGERATING THE NATURE AND IMPORTANCE OF DNA EVIDENCE.
QUESTIONS OF FACT WHETHER PLAINTIFF’S INJURIES WERE CAUSED BY THE PLACEMENT OF THE SCAFFOLD OR THE ABSENCE OF RAILINGS.
ALTHOUGH THE TWO THYROID SURGERIES WERE PERFORMED BY THE SAME DOCTOR, THE 2005 SURGERY AND THE 2010 SURGERY WERE DISCRETE EVENTS; THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS WAS NOT TOLLED BY THE CONTINUOUS TREATMENT DOCTRINE (FOURTH DEPT).
FAILURE TO PRESERVE SURVEILLANCE VIDEOS TRIGGERED NEED FOR ADVERSE INFERENCE JURY INSTRUCTION.
Hearsay Statements Exonerating Defendant Properly Excluded as Not Meeting the Reliability Requirement for a “Statement Against Penal Interest”
MOTION TO AMEND THE COMPLAINT SHOULD HAVE BEEN GRANTED, CRITERIA EXPLAINED, CIVIL CONSPIRACY CLAIM PROPERLY ALLEGED (FOURTH DEPT).
DEFENDANTS IN THIS WRONGFUL DEATH CASE WERE ENTITLED TO DISCOVERY OF TAX RETURNS TO DETERMINE WHETHER THE MOTHER AND FATHER WERE MARRIED AT THE TIME OF MOTHER’S DEATH, IF SO, THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS HAD PASSED (FOURTH DEPT).
IT MAY HAVE BEEN ERROR TO ALLOW THE VICTIM TO TESTIFY ACCOMPANIED BY A DOG, BUT THE ISSUE WAS NOT PRESERVED; ALTHOUGH THE PROSECUTOR MADE AN IMPROPER COMMENT IT DID NOT REQUIRE REVERSAL; PROSECUTORS ADMONISHED THAT THEIR ROLE IS TO ENSURE JUSTICE IS DONE, NOT SIMPLY SEEK CONVICTIONS (FOURTH DEPT).

Categories

Sign Up for the Mailing List to Be Notified When the Site Is Updated.

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Copyright © 2026 New York Appellate Digest, Inc.
Site by CurlyHost | Privacy Policy

DEFENDANT WAS ACQUITTED OF MENACING AT THE FIRST TRIAL BUT THE EVIDENCE SUPPORTING... THE SPECIAL PROSECUTOR APPOINTED TO HANDLE DEFENDANT’S CASE DID NOT MEET...