Teamsters Local 856 v. Priceless, LLC

• Citation: 112 Cal.App.4th 1500,5 Cal.Rptr.3d 847
• Decision Date: 31 October 2003
• Docket Number: No. A102255.,A102255.
• Court: California Court of Appeals
• Parties: TEAMSTERS LOCAL 856 et al., Plaintiffs and Respondents, v. PRICELESS, LLC, et al. Defendants and Appellants.

5 Cal.Rptr.3d 847

112 Cal.App.4th 1500

TEAMSTERS LOCAL 856 et al., Plaintiffs and Respondents, v. PRICELESS, LLC, et al. Defendants and Appellants.

No. A102255.

Court of Appeal, First District, Division 1.

October 31, 2003.

Review Denied January 22, 2004.

Edward P. Davis, Jr., East Palo Alto, Kathryn E. Karcher, San Diego, James M. Chadwick, Nicole P. Dogwill, East Palo Alto, Gray, Cary, Ware & Freidenrich, for Appellants Priceless, LLC et al.

Larry E. Anderson, City Attorney, for Appellant City of Burlingame.

Robert J. Lanzone, Jean B. Savaree, San Carlos, Aaronson, Dickerson, Cohn & Lanzone, for Appellant Cities of Belmont, Foster City & San Carlos.

Kelli L. Sager, Susan E. Seager, Los Angeles, Davis Wright Tremaine, and Thomas R. Burke, Oakland, for The California Newspaper Publishers Association et al, as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendants and Appellants.

Andrew H. Baker, San Francisco, Beeson, Tayer & Bodine, for Respondents Teamsters Local 856, AFSCME Local 829, and AFSCME Local 2190.

W. Daniel Boone, Vincent A. Harrington, Jr., Oakland, M. Suzanne Murphy, Van Bourg, Weinberg, Roger & Rosenfeld, for Respondent Services Employees International Union Local 715, AFL-CIO.

Barbara S. Blinderman, Dennis A. Winston, Los Angeles, Moskowitz, Brestoff, Winston & Blinderman, for James Lissner and Courier Graphics Corporation (dba Claremont Courier), as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendants and Appellants.

Jeffrey V. Dunn, Sonia R. Carvalho, and Mark D. Servino, Irvine, Best, Best & Krieger, for City of Calremont, as Amicus

Curiae on behalf of Defendants and Appellants.

Gregory G. Petersen, Cherry-Marie D. Rojas, Micah S. Lachtman, Castle, Petersen & Krasuse, for City of Claremont Management Association, as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Plaintiff and Respondent.

MARCHIANO, P.J.

Priceless, LLC, a limited liability corporation that operates newspaper companies as the "Daily News" in various cities throughout the San Francisco Bay Area, appeals from a preliminary injunction that allowed the release of information regarding public employee salaries in various cities, but limited the form of the information to prohibit disclosure of compensation received by individually identifiable employees.

The narrow issue presented on appeal is whether the trial court properly issued the preliminary injunction withholding the names of individual public employees pending resolution of the newspaper's request for detailed employee salary information from local governmental entities.

We affirm the order granting the preliminary injunction in light of the evidence submitted to the trial court.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

In February of 2003, Christina Bellantoni, a reporter for the Daily News, sent requests for records pursuant to the California Public Records Act (CPRA) to numerous San Francisco Bay Area cities. (Gov.Code, § 6250 et seq.)¹ The letters cited the CPRA, and stated: "Specifically, I would like the names, titles and W2 wages of all [city] employees for the 12 months ending Dec. 31, 2002. By W2 wages, I mean all compensation paid to these employees during the year, including regular hours, overtime, bonuses, etc."²

According to Bellantoni's declaration, a number of cities provided the records as requested, but: "most cities, including the Cities involved in this litigation, either indicated that they would need additional time to respond or provided inconclusive responses."

On March 13, 2003, counsel for Teamsters Local 856 notified the Daily News that it and other unions that represented municipal employees intended to seek to enjoin disclosure of the individual employees' names and salaries to the Daily News. Following this notice, counsel for the Daily News spoke with city attorneys who indicated they would now withhold information pending resolution of the action.

On March 17, 2003, Teamsters Local 856 and American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Locals 829 and 2190 (the Unions) filed a complaint for injunctive relief naming as defendants the cities of Atherton, Burlingame, Foster City, San Carlos and Belmont (the Cities) and the Daily News.³ The complaint alleged that release of the employees' names would be an invasion of privacy and would cause irreparable harm. It also alleged that release of the information regarding peace officer employees would violate Penal Code section 832.7. The complaint sought preliminary and permanent injunctions.

On March 19, 2003, the Unions filed a motion for a preliminary injunction. The motion was supported by two declarations from union officials stating that, to their knowledge, the salary of individual employees was maintained as confidential information by the Cities. The third supporting declaration was from a law clerk at the office of the Unions' counsel, stating that as of March 14, each of the Cities was prepared to provide the first initial and last name of each employee with his or her corresponding 2002 base earnings, overtime earnings and bonus earnings. The City of Atherton was also prepared to provide that information for police officers.

The Daily News filed opposition to the request for a preliminary injunction, arguing that the items of information requested were public records, were not exempt from the provisions of the CPRA and that disclosure would not infringe on any privacy interest.⁴ The Daily News attached a copy of a federal administrative regulation regarding disclosure of personnel information, an opinion of a superior court in Bakersfield, and copies of the plaintiff Unions' collective bargaining agreements.

The City of Burlingame filed a response, accompanied by the declaration of the City Attorney and a copy of the city's administrative procedure regarding release of information. The policy stated that credit information requests are referred to the payroll or personnel department which will supply information regarding date of hire, position titles and earnings information when permission is given by the employee. Other employee information is not given out. That city's memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the firefighter's union was also attached to the city attorney's declaration. The MOU stated that the city would release information only upon "proper identification of the inquirer and acceptable reasons for the inquiry." Such information is limited to verification of employment, length of employment and verification of salary if the inquirer first indicates the correct salary. "Release of more specific information may only be authorized by the employee." Finally, the city attached a page from instructions for forms W-2, published by the United States Department of the Treasury, which stated that information provided on form W-2 was confidential, subject to specific, limited disclosure.

The trial court heard argument on the preliminary injunction on April 2, 2003. When the court noted that some objections to the declarations submitted by plaintiffs would be sustained, the city attorneys agreed to a stipulation that in each of the involved cities, the salary information of individual employees is kept confidential as a part of the personnel file. Defendant Daily News objected only to relevance and the court accepted the stipulation. No other evidence was presented by the plaintiffs and there was no evidentiary ruling on the declarations.

After hearing argument, the court reversed its tentative decision to deny the injunction outright and ordered release of the requested information without the names of the individual employees. The court's opinion stated: "during the pendency of this action, Defendant Cities ... are hereby restrained and enjoined, ... from ... releasing [to the Daily News] ... records containing salary, overtime, bonus or any other compensation information, in any such form that discloses such compensation received by individually identifiable employees with respect to any of the defendant Cities' employees employed in any bargaining unit represented by any of the plaintiff Unions...." The court also ordered release within 20 days of all information not prohibited by its order. The court expressly found: "a reasonable expectation of privacy in the employees based on the confidentiality policies of the City and a failure to articulate or show the public interest in the disclosure of information linked to individuals." On April 9, 2003, the Daily News appealed.⁵

In compliance with the court's order, the defendant Cities released detailed listings of salaries, itemized as to each city employee, but identifying the particular employee only by job title. For example, the City of San Carlos listed the total salary, bonus and overtime paid to: "Administrative Assistant—1." It listed the same information for "Administrative Assistant— 2" and "Administrative Assistant—3," and so on for all employees in that job classification. Other cities submitted similarly detailed information for each city employee, omitting only the names.

DISCUSSION

On appeal, the Daily News argues that disclosure is mandated, no statutory exemption applies and that the trial court erred in placing a burden on it to justify its request for public information. The Unions respond that the constitutional privacy interests of its represented employees must be weighed against the public's right to know the workings of government and that the trial court properly adjusted those competing interests by withholding the individual's names pending a trial on the merits.⁶

We emphasize that the only question properly before us at this time is whether the trial court erred in issuing the preliminary injunction. We are reminded by the Cities involved in this case that they seek to assert the rights of all city employees, and not just the union employees that are subject to the preliminary injunction. In addition, amicus curiae California Newspaper Publishers Association requested that we take judicial notice of ...