Publication of LGOIMA Requests
Karen Anderson made this Official Information request to Dunedin City Council
Response to this request is long overdue. By law Dunedin City Council should have responded by now (details and exceptions). The requester can complain to the Ombudsman.
From: Karen Anderson
Dear Dunedin City Council,
My preference is to receive the requested information by email.
The “Official Information – LGOIMA"(1) page on the DCC website states:
“When publishing the requests we will withhold the names of individual requestors to protect their privacy.”
The “LGOIMA Responses”(2) page states:
“Individual requestors' privacy will be protected and only requests and responses that have wider public interest will be published here.
...
Information requested by the media, from public sector organisations and MPs will always be published while information specific to an individual or their property will not generally be published.”
The “responses” page links to pages ordered by year, that publish information considered to be of public interest. All the pages comprise a list of requests ordered by date. Each one states the name of the requester.
Inspection of the “responses” quickly reveals the majority are not made by the media, public sector organisations or Members of Parliament.
In many cases the information requested is specific to the individual, or their property. Some information is provided in attachments that are not published, or via a link to a non-public section of the DCC website that permits access for only a few days.
Further inspection immediately discloses email addresses, physical addresses and even telephone numbers of the person who made the request, and even parties not related to the request. At least one "response" contains the personal details of members of the public who had witnessed an incident in a public place that was the subject of a formal investigation by “Compliance Solutions”.
None of these type of requests, or the “response” suggest a public interest in the information, the personal details of the person who made the request, or the personal details of other individuals that has been published.
Accordingly I have been requested by members of the Dunedin Dog Bylaw Group to ask for the legislative provisions or case law that authorise the DCC to make statements about how privacy will be managed, then act in the opposite manner.
The “Official Information – LGOIMA” page states:
“Information released, which may be of interest to the general public, will be published on the Council's website …”
The last published requests are dated October 2017.
Accordingly I have been requested by members of the Dunedin Dog Bylaw Group to ask for confirmation the DCC has not received any requests for information of general public interest since October 2017.
Yours faithfully,
Karen Anderson
(1) “Official Information - LGOIMA - Dunedin City Council” <https://www.dunedin.govt.nz/your-council...> Accessed 12 January 2019.
(2) “LGOIMA Responses - Dunedin City Council” <https://www.dunedin.govt.nz/your-council...>.accessed 12 January 2019.
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- Add an annotation (to help the requester or others)
- Download a zip file of all correspondence
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Dave Clemens left an annotation ()
Karen, The following response from DCC dated May 21 2018 may be of some relevance to your request. I asked about updating of the same page as it seemed to me that DCC had previously run one of the more proactive release systems in NZ. I also sent the DCC response on to the Otago Daily Times in case they wanted to follow up on open government in their 'patch'. Dave Clemens
'Thank you for your email asking about what has happened to recent updates of LGOIMA’s on our website. I advise that we have not discontinued providing the updates, but acknowledge that we do have a back log of requests to publish on our website. We will endeavour to get our answered LGOIMA’s published on our website as soon as possible. I am sorry I am unable to provide you with cost estimates for maintaining the page, as we do not hold this information.
As part of your request has not been answered, i.e., cost estimates for maintain the page, you are advised that you have the right to complain to the Office of the Ombudsman (0800 802 602) or e-mail: info@ombudsman.parliament.nz
Kind regards
Sharon Bodeker
Link to this