Explore Info. Servs. v. COURT INFO. SYS, 98-2264.

• Decision Date: 15 November 2001
• Docket Number: No. 98-2264.,98-2264.
• Citation: 636 N.W.2d 50
• Parties: EXPLORE INFORMATION SERVICES, a Division of Ram Center, Inc., Appellant, v. The IOWA COURT INFORMATION SYSTEM, the Judicial Department, and the Iowa Department of Transportation, Appellees.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

636 N.W.2d 50

EXPLORE INFORMATION SERVICES, a Division of Ram Center, Inc., Appellant, v. The IOWA COURT INFORMATION SYSTEM, the Judicial Department, and the Iowa Department of Transportation, Appellees.

No. 98-2264.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

November 15, 2001.

James Carney, Des Moines, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Pamela Griebel, Assistant Attorney General, and David Ferree, Special Assistant Attorney General, for appellees.

LAVORATO, Chief Justice.

Explore Information Services appeals from a district court ruling on its application for adjudication of law points and its motion to reconsider pursuant to Iowa Rule of Civil Procedure 179(b). Because we conclude the rule 179(b) motion was not an appropriate challenge to the adjudication of law points ruling, Explore's filing of the rule 179(b) motion did not toll the time for appeal. The time for appeal expired long before the rule 179(b) ruling, resulting in an untimely appeal. We therefore must dismiss the appeal.

I. Background Facts and Proceedings.

Explore Information Services (Explore), a division of RAM Center, Inc., is a Minnesota corporation. Since 1992, Explore has provided insurance companies with information related to convictions for driving violations in fifteen states. Insurance companies use this information to determine whether they should issue or renew policies.

Before 1995, Explore employees would take laptop computers to the clerk's offices in the ninety-nine Iowa county courthouses, look up the actual citations given to drivers, and enter into their computers data on adjudicated citations. The open records law gave Explore's employees free access to the records.

In 1995, Explore began receiving driving conviction information electronically from each county's district court clerk, via the Iowa Court Information System (ICIS). According to Explore, it and ICIS entered into an "agreement" whereby ICIS would provide the compiled conviction data from all Iowa counties once a month in an electronic format, charging a fee of $100 to $200 per month.

Iowa Code section 321.491 requires district court clerks to create abstracts of driving convictions and forfeitures of bail and forward the records to the Iowa Department of Transportation (IDOT) within ten days after the conviction or forfeiture of bail. Iowa Code § 321.491 (1997). A 1994 amendment to section 321.491 authorized clerks to create and forward the information in electronic format. 1994 Iowa Acts ch. 1074, § 2. Before 1997, section 321.491 did not impose a fee on public requests for copies of driving conviction records. But once the records were forwarded to the IDOT, that agency charged fifty cents per record. Iowa Code § 321.10 (1997) (authorizing the IDOT to provide upon request a certified copy of any record of the department, charging a fee of fifty cents per document).

In 1997, the legislature amended section 321.491 to require district court clerks to collect a fifty-cent fee "for each copy of any record of conviction or forfeiture of bail furnished to any requestor except the [IDOT] or other local, state or federal government entity." 1997 Iowa Acts ch. 104, § 23. Money collected by the clerks of court would be transferred to the IDOT. Id. According to a fiscal note, the fee collected would "be used to enhance the efficiency of processing records and information" between the IDOT and ICIS.

The 1997 amendment went into effect July 1 of that year. Shortly thereafter, the judicial branch, pursuant to the amendment, began charging Explore fifty cents for each copy of a driving conviction record. Explore's bills increased from between $100 and $200 per month to between $20,000 and $30,000 per month.

Several months later, this court denied Explore's application for a supervisory order and request for a temporary injunction. Thereafter, on November 12, 1997, Explore filed a petition for declaratory judgment and immediate temporary injunction in the district court. Explore alleged that since the 1997 amendment to section 321.491, the IDOT "has insisted that ICIS collect" the fifty-cent fee from Explore. Explore claimed the billing practices

insisted upon by the IDOT and carried out by ICIS are: (a) not authorized or required by Iowa law ...; (b) in violation of Iowa public records law ...; (c) in violation of Iowa's long standing public policy to provide public records for the reasonable cost of reproduction; and (d) ... unconstitutional.

Explore requested an immediate temporary injunction restraining ICIS and the IDOT from demanding payment in excess of the reasonable cost of reproduction of the driving conviction records in an electronic format. It also requested the court enter a declaratory judgment (1) holding Iowa law does not authorize or require billing "in the manner done by ICIS, at the direction of the IDOT," (2) directing ICIS and the IDOT to provide driving conviction records at a cost of no more than the reasonable cost of reproduction of the records, and (3) directing ICIS and the IDOT to refund to Explore all sums paid in excess of reasonable costs of reproduction.

On November 25, ICIS filed a motion to dismiss or, alternatively, to correct or recast the petition. ICIS claimed because it was not a legal entity subject to suit, it must be dismissed as a defendant, or Explore must replace it with a defendant with the capacity to be sued. This motion prompted Explore to amend its petition by adding the judicial branch as a defendant. The record does not show that the district court ever ruled on ICIS's motion to dismiss. (For convenience we hereinafter refer to ICIS and the judicial branch collectively as "the judicial branch.")

Following a hearing on December 12, the district court granted Explore's motion for temporary injunction. The court ordered the judicial branch to continue providing Explore with conviction information as it had since passage of the 1997 amendment. However, the court enjoined the judicial branch from collecting the fifty-cent per record fee if Explore posted a sufficient bond. Explore posted the bond.

On June 17, 1998, Explore filed an application for adjudication of law points, which the judicial branch resisted. Explore asked the district court to answer the following:

Whether Iowa Code section 321.491, unnumbered paragraph 2, Code Supp. 1997, authorizes or directs the judicial branch to collect a fee of [fifty cents] for each copy of any record of conviction or forfeiture of bail, when such records are provided through the Iowa Court Information System, in electronic format, on a monthly basis, in bulk.

Explore submitted a statement of uncontroverted facts with its application.

Meanwhile, the legislature again amended Iowa Code section 321.491. See 1998 Iowa Acts ch. 1178, § 9. The 1998 amendment became effective July 1, 1998, and distinguished between individual copies of driving conviction records furnished at the clerk's office and records supplied in bulk electronic form. It required district court clerks to collect the fifty-cent fee for each individual copy of conviction records furnished to requestors at the clerk's office.

The 1998 amendment added the following language to paragraph 2 of section 321.491:

Notwithstanding any other provision in this section or chapter 22, the judicial department shall be the provider of public electronic access to the clerk's records of convictions and forfeitures of bail through the Iowa court information system and shall, if such records are provided monthly to a vendor, ... collect a fee from such vendor which is the greater of three thousand dollars per month or the actual direct cost of providing the records.

1998 Iowa Acts ch. 1178, § 9.

On September 10, 1998, the district court filed its ruling on Explore's motion to adjudicate law points. The court discussed the 1997 and 1998 amendments to section 321.491. The court concluded that the 1998 amendment was a material change to the statute and as a result was presumed to alter the law. The court further concluded that the 1997 amendment did not create an exemption for records provided by the judicial branch, and refused to read such an exemption into the 1997 amendment. Finally, the court concluded:

Iowa Code section 321.491, unnumbered paragraph 2, Code Supp.1997, authorized the judicial branch to collect a fee of fifty cents for each copy of any record of conviction or forfeiture of bail when such records are provided through the IDOT, any clerk of court office, or through ICIS, in electronic form or otherwise, from July 1, 1997 through June 30, 1998. Because of this conclusion, no other pending motions need be ruled upon. This ruling disposes of the case, which is hereby dismissed, with court costs to be paid by plaintiff.

Explore filed a motion for reconsideration pursuant to Iowa Rule of Civil Procedure 179(b), requesting that the court consider the transcript of the temporary injunction proceedings. Explore attached to its motion for reconsideration a transcript of the temporary injunction proceedings, portions of a deposition, answers to interrogatories, and a response to a request for the production of documents. Explore asked the court to examine the attached materials, reconsider its ruling, and either rule in Explore's favor or, in the alternative, set the matter for oral hearing in order to take additional evidence.

The judicial branch resisted, arguing in part that a rule 179(b) motion was not the proper vehicle to challenge the court's ruling on the application to adjudicate law points.

The district court denied Explore's rule 179(b) motion on November 30, 1998. The court did not determine whether its prior ruling could be challenged by a rule 179(b) motion, concluding that it was "not convinced its prior decision was in error."

Explore appealed. The judicial branch moved to dismiss the appeal as untimely. Later, we ordered the motion to dismiss be submitted with the appeal and instructed ...