Kottschade v. Lundberg, 40933
| Decision Date | 28 June 1968 |
| Docket Number | No. 40933,40933 |
| Citation | 160 N.W.2d 135,280 Minn. 501 |
| Parties | Ambrose KOTTSCHADE, Appellant, v. Gerald LUNDBERG, County Assessor of Aitkin County, Minnesota, Respondent. |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Syllabus by the Court
The work sheets, commonly referred to as 'field cards,' on which an assessor in the field records his comments or observations with respect to each piece of property which he assesses, are not 'public records' within the meaning of Minn.St. 15.17, subd. 4, which requires that public records be made available for inspection by any member of the public.
Carl E. Erickson, Brainerd, for appellant.
Thomas B. Cline, County Atty., Aitkin, for respondent.
Douglas M. Head, Atty. Gen., Richard H. Kyle, Sol. Gen., Gerald T. Laurie, Ralph W. Peterson, Spec. Ass't Attys. Gen., St. Paul, amicus curiae for Commissioner of Taxation.
Cant, Haverstock, Gray, Plant & Mooty and Kenneth Anderson, Minneapolis, amicus curiae for Minn. Assn. of Assessing Officers, and Minn. Assessor's Assn.
Heard before KNUTSON, C.J., and NELSON, MURPHY, OTIS, and FRANK T. GALLAGHER, JJ.
Appeal by plaintiff from a judgment of the district court refusing to compel defendant to make certain appraisal cards available for inspection and reproduction.
Plaintiff, Ambrose Kottschade, is the executive director of the Minnesota Lakeshore League, Inc., an association of 4,000 people who own lakeshore property in Minnesota. Its primary objective is to assure equitable real estate tax treatment to its members. Approximately 250 members own lakeshore property in Aitkin County.
'Field cards' are forms designed by the county assessors but patterned after forms provided by the commissioner of taxation on which the assessor records his observations and opinions with respect to each piece of property which he assesses. The cards typically contain comments on topographical features and size and condition of buildings as well as opinion about full and true market value. They are in bound ledgers which the local assessors deposit with the county assessor after completing them. The ledgers are kept by the county assessor for a few years, but then apparently are destroyed. The valuations contained in the field cards are recorded in permanent assessment books at 30 percent of full and true value. Admittedly, these assessment books do not contain much of the detailed information found on the field cards.
On March 13, 1967, plaintiff went to the Aitkin County assessor's office to inspect and reproduce appraisal records. Defendant, who is the county assessor, was absent, but the deputy assessor granted plaintiff access to field cards which had been made by assessors who conducted a state equalization assessment in 1966. Plaintiff photographed 71 of these cards.
On March 14 plaintiff returned to the county assessor's office to complete his work. Defendant, acting on the advice of the county attorney, refused to allow plaintiff to inspect the field cards. Thereupon plaintiff obtained an order to show cause from the Aitkin County District Court requiring defendant to show cause why an order should not issue compelling defendant to permit plaintiff to inspect all records in defendant's custody, including field cards.
After a hearing on April 10, 1967, the court held that the field cards, which are also known as work sheets in the office of the county assessor, are not public records and that defendant was not required to permit plaintiff to inspect, examine, abstract, or copy them. Judgment was ordered accordingly. In a memorandum made a part of its findings, the court expressed the opinion that a public record is one which could be introduced into evidence without foundation or which could be certified by the public officer making the same, but that work sheets or field cards are not public records open to examination by any individual and that there was no law requiring field cards to be made.
The sole issue presented on this appeal is whether field cards are public records which must, under Minn.St. 15.17, subd. 4, be open to public inspection.
Is the field card a 'public record'? Not, it would seem, as that term is popularly used. It is neither a memorial of an official transaction nor a document received from members of the public in the ordinary course of official business. Nor is a field card within the common-law definition of 'public record.' In Wiley v. Woods, 393 Pa. 341, 141 A.2d 844, petitioner sought to compel discovery of field notes on which an investigator had recorded observations and comments with respect to particular properties in a zoning district. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court denied the petition for mandamus. The applicable statute, it said, did not require disclosure of field notes. The statute involved differed materially from § 15.17, so the statutory analysis is not helpful here, but the court went further, saying that at common law such notes did not constitute public records. The question, therefore, boils down to whether § 15.17 requires disclosure of field cards which would not, in its absence, be subject to disclosure.
Section 15.17 reads, in pertinent part:
* * *
The operative language of subd. 1--that officers 'shall make and keep all records necessary to a full and accurate knowledge of their official activities'--is broad indeed. Read literally, it seems to place no bounds on the information which must be made a public record. Any casual jotting, any tear-sheet observation, which discloses the promptings of official action, is to some extent 'necessary to a full and accurate knowledge of * * * official activities.' But it appears to us that the legislature did not intend anything that sweeping. Such a broad definition of public records would fill official archives to...
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Lopez v. Fitzgerald
...(1977), 279 Md. 468, 369 A.2d 558 (reports gathered in investigating whether gun permit should be revoked); Kottschade v. Lundberg (1968), 280 Minn. 501, 160 N.W.2d 135 (tax-valuation appraisal cards); Wiley v. Woods (1958), 393 Pa. 341, 141 A.2d 844 (data pertaining to petition for rezonin......
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Peterson v. Martinez, A17-0355
...to an official decision, and not information relating to the process by which such a decision was reached." Kottschade v. Lundberg, 280 Minn. 501, 505, 160 N.W.2d 135, 138 (1968). The board-related respondents' alleged conduct did not violate this statute. The board retained the assessment ......
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Metropolitan Sports Facilities Com'n v. County of Hennepin
...have a strong civic interest in seeing that other taxpayers as well as themselves pay their fair share. See Kottschade v. Lundberg, 280 Minn. 501, 507, 160 N.W.2d 135, 139 (1968) ("there is great public interest in real estate taxation and equalization of taxes"). While the amount of taxes ......
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Halva v. Minn. State Colls. & Univs., A19-0481
...relief. See Minneapolis Star & Trib. Co. v. State , 282 Minn. 86, 163 N.W.2d 46, 48–49 (1968) ; see also Kottschade v. Lundberg , 280 Minn. 501, 160 N.W.2d 135, 138–39 (1968). In 1979, the Legislature amended the Official Records Act and folded any potential Official Records Act remedy into......