NJ OPRA Blog

On June 7, 2021, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Attorney General by upholding Law Enforcement Directives Nos. 2020-5 and No. 2020-6, which ordered law enforcement agencies throughout the state to annually publish the names of police officers who were either terminated, demoted or suspended for more than 5 days.  We previously blogged about the Directives here and here.

Chief Justice Stuart Rabner delivered the opinion of a unanimous court finding that Attorney General Gurbir S. Grewal had the authority to issue the Directives, which are, “consistent with ...

It's Sunshine Week and this year it kicks off in New Jersey with oral arguments before our Supreme Court in an important Open Public Records Act (OPRA) case.

On March 15, 2021, the Supreme Court will hear Bozzi v. City of Jersey City, a case that asks whether a list of names and addresses of dog license holders are accessible under OPRA. The plaintiff seeks the list for commercial purposes--he intends to mail dog owners information about his invisible fences.  The case is listed as the second case of the day, which means arguments will begin sometime after 11:00 a.m. 

CJ Griffin of Pashman Stein ...

Today the New Jersey Supreme Court agreed to hear the plaintiff's appeal in Libertarians for Transparent Gov't v. Cumberland County, 465 N.J. Super. 11 (App. Div. 2020), a published decision that shut down public access to non-litigation settlement agreements that resolve a public employee's internal discipline.

CJ Griffin of Pashman Stein Walder Hayden P.C. filed the successful petition for certification. We will blog soon with more details about the case and the issues before the Supreme Court. In the meantime, readers can view John Paff's blog for more details about the matter ...

Happy New Year! The year 2020 was a year unlike any other. As we look back at transparency issues that arose over the past year, we hope that this blog finds our readers healthy and well.

Pandemic Creates Transparency Hurdles

Transparency was front and center in New Jersey in 2020, although sometimes it was the lack of transparency that was the focus.

On March 9, 2020, Governor Murphy issued Executive Order No. 103 to declare a Public Health Emergency in New Jersey. Days later, the Legislature rushed to amend the Open Public Meetings Act (OPRA) so that public agencies would not have to comply ...

We recently blogged about Rivera v. Union County Prosecutor's Office, where the trial court granted access to the internal affairs reports of the former Police Director of the City of Elizabeth Police Department, who was the subject of an internal affairs investigation that concluded that he used "racist and misogynistic slurs" in the workplace. As an update, the Appellate Division reversed that decision and concluded that the records were not subject to OPRA on June 19, 2020.

Unfortunately, the Appellate Division did not simply deny access under OPRA. It also concluded that the ...

In 2017, CJ Griffin of Pashman Stein Walder Hayden filed an OPRA lawsuit against the New Jersey State Police on behalf of Libertarians for Transparent Government, seeking the identity of a state trooper who had been "required to separate from employment" for "engaging in racially offensive behavior." The trial court dismissed the lawsuit and the Appellate Division affirmed that dismissal, but the New Jersey Supreme Court agreed to hear the case. The appeal is pending.

Today, the State released the name of the trooper.

Additionally, the Attorney General revised the Attorney General ...

Readers may recall from numerous news articles that in April 2019, the Union County Prosecutor's Office (UCPO) concluded that former City of Elizabeth Police Director James Cosgrove used "racist and misogynistic" language in the workplace. The Attorney General issued a press release confirming the internal affairs investigation's findings, calling on Cosgrove to resign, and making leadership changes at UCPO.

After UCPO denied an OPRA request for Cosgrove's internal affairs reports, CJ Griffin filed a lawsuit on behalf of Plaintiff Richard Rivera seeking access to the reports ...

The New Jersey Supreme Court has granted an OPRA requestor's Petition for Certification and agreed to hear an appeal in Libertarians for Transparent Government v. New Jersey State Police.

The question the Court certified is:

"Does section ten of the Open Public Records Act, N.J.S.A. 47:1A-10, require disclosure of the name of a state trooper listed in the Office of Professional Standard’s annual report to the Legislature as having been terminated for misconduct?"

For background, N.J.S.A. 47:1A-10 states that personnel records are generally exempt under OPRA, but provides ...

According to N.J.S.A. 47:1A-6, a records requestor who prevails in any proceeding shall be entitled to an award of reasonable attorneys' fees. We have written about OPRA's fee-shifting provision before, noting that without the fee-shift most requestors would not have the funds to challenge denials of access. As a result, the state would be far less transparent.

On August 14, 2019, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit issued an important published opinion relating to OPRA's mandatory fee-shifting provision.

The case, titled Golden v. New Jersey Institute for ...

When Pashman Stein Walder Hayden partners CJ Griffin and Samuel J. Samaro received the unanimous decision in North Jersey Media Group Inc. v. Twp. of Lyndhurst, 229 N.J. 541 (2017), from the New Jersey Supreme Court on July 11, 2017, it was clear that this hard-fought matter was a landmark case that would have significant impact on transparency about the use of force by police in the state of New Jersey. The Court had granted access via the Open Public Records Act (OPRA) and common law to police records and dash cam footage of a high-speed police chase and the fatal use of force on a ...

Last week, Bergen County Assignment Judge Bonnie J. Mizdol issued an opinion finding that the Borough of North Arlington unlawfully imposed a special service charge upon a records requestor who sought records from the Borough's Facebook pages.

The OPRA request at issue in Wronko v. North Arlington sought the list of individuals who had been banned from the Borough's Facebook page, as well as a list of any words that had been censored and the list of page administrators. In response, the Borough insisted it needed to use an outside IT consultant to capture the screenshots necessary to ...

Last week, CJ Griffin filed an OPRA lawsuit on behalf of Richard Rivera against the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office (ECPO) relating to its refusal to disclose the name of a Newark police officer who shot at a fleeing vehicle during a pursuit in January 2019, killing the driver and injuring the passenger. The lawsuit also seeks access to footage from police body-worn cameras and dash cameras.

ECPO denied the request because it is “concerned” that the officer may refuse to testify before the grand jury if his or her name is publicly disclosed. Mr. Rivera’s lawsuit argues that this ...

In September 2018, we filed a lawsuit on behalf of long-time client Steven Wronko seeking the list of users that Carteret Mayor Daniel J. Reiman has banned from his Facebook page.

Carteret opposed the lawsuit, arguing that Mayor Reiman's Facebook page was simply a personal page and that he has constitutional right to ban members of the public and a privacy interest in keeping the ban list secret.

We responded and provided over 200 pages of screenshots from the Mayor's Facebook page which showed that Mayor Reiman used his Facebook page to declare weather emergencies and keep the public ...

Happy New Year! 2018 was a very busy year for the OPRA team at Pashman Stein Walder Hayden.

Here's a look back on some of the highlights...

• Partner CJ Griffin argued before the New Jersey Supreme Court two times, representing amicus curiae in Brennan v. Bergen County Prosecutor's Office and Paff v. Ocean County Prosecutor's Office.
• The Appellate Division issued a published opinion in Scheeler v. Atlantic County Joint Municipal Insurance Fund, granting our client's appeal and ruling that one does not need to be a New Jersey citizen in order to access records under OPRA.
• In a published ...

CJ Griffin, a member of Pashman Stein Walder Hayden's Media Law Group, was interviewed by Marketplace regarding a prior OPRA lawsuit she brought against the City of Newark seeking its Amazon HQ2 bid.

The public radio program, “What's in Those Amazon HQ2 Bids? It's Not Entirely Clear” by Renata Sago and Leila Goldstein, aired on Tuesday, November 6^th.

“There’s hundreds of millions or billions of dollars, of tax dollars, at stake," said CJ Griffin, a partner at Pashman Stein Walder Hayden, who argued the case. "That’s taxpayer money. When you give tax breaks, that impacts ...

NJ Advance Media has written about the recent lawsuit we filed on behalf of Libertarians for Transparent Government seeking a settlement/separation agreement between Cumberland County and a corrections officer who allegedly had inappropriate relationships with inmates. The lawsuit also asks the Court to find that Cumberland County violated OPRA when it told Plaintiff that the corrections officer was "terminated for disciplinary reasons," when the Pension Board's meeting minutes state that he was allowed to "retire in good standing."

PSWH partner CJ Griffin is quoted in the ...

This week, the New Jersey Supreme Court issued a split decision (4-3) in Paff v. Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office and once again ruled that dash camera videos that pertain to criminal investigations are not subject to the Open Public Records Act (OPRA).

While the decision is a serious disappointment to transparency advocates, it does not actually change the status quo. Last year, in North Jersey Media Group Inc. v. Township of Lyndhurst, a unanimous Supreme Court ruled that the dash cam video of a police-involved deadly shooting was not subject to OPRA because there was no Attorney ...

The New York Times has published an article about the serious lack of transparency regarding the proposals that cities have submitted bids to Amazon for their HQ2 Headquarters. Despite the fact that the taxpayers of the winning city will be on the hook for billions of dollars in incentives, too many cities are still keeping the public in the dark about what Amazon is being offered.

The article references our lawsuit, which secured access to the City of Newark's bid, which we published.

We previously wrote about an OPRA lawsuit we filed on behalf of citizen seeking a list of users that various public officials from Glen Rock have blocked from their official Facebook accounts. Today we are happy to report that the suit was successful.

In Larkin v. Glen Rock, the Honorable Bonnie J. Mizdol, A.J.S.C., ruled that the lists of blocked users from each of the Facebook pages in questions were "government records" that are subject to access under OPRA. In her 23-page opinion, the judge noted that there is no "one-size-fit-all" approach to determine whether a particular Facebook ...

On June 4, 2018, the Appellate Division issued an unpublished OPRA opinion titled Benedetto v Russo and Union County. While the opinion is not binding on lower courts because it is unpublished, we think it is helpful in several ways.

First, the case involves very important records: incident reports regarding suicide and suspicious deaths within a County Correctional Facility. Given the widespread coverage regarding several deaths in the Hudson County Jail recently, it is important that the public has access to information about these deaths and the conditions inside the jail.

In ...

CJ Griffin of Pashman Stein Walder Hayden Submitted Amicus Curiae
Brief on Behalf of Non-profit Organization
in Brennan v. Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office

Hackensack, NJ (May 23, 2018) – The Supreme Court of New Jersey has issued its opinion in Brennan v. Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office, in which Pashman Stein Walder Hayden partner CJ Griffin submitted an amicus curiae brief on behalf of Libertarians for Transparent Government, a non-profit organization. The Court’s decision today provides important guidance to lower courts on how to apply the Open Public ...

Government agencies often distribute surveys to the public regarding various issues of public concern. Are the completed surveys subject to public access under OPRA? We think so and a court is being asked to decide.

Recently, we learned of an OPRA lawsuit filed by a requestor who seeks the results of a survey that was sent to residents of the Borough of Saddle River. The survey, which was sent by a local veterinarian who serves on the Borough's Non-Lethal Deer Population Control Committee, asked residents whether they would allow access to their property to carry out a non-lethal deer ...

We previously blogged about an OPRA lawsuit we filed on behalf of an activist seeking access to Newark's Amazon HQ2 proposal. We are happy to announce that Newark has now released its proposal to our client.

Newark's proposal is titled, "Yes, Newark." As evidenced by the privilege log it attached to the proposal, Newark redacted approximately 6 pages from its 200+ page proposal. These pages contained the financial incentives that Newark is offering to Amazon. All other information has been disclosed. We consider this a significant transparency victory.

"I strongly believe in open ...

It's a hot button topic: are government officials creating government records that are subject to OPRA when they utilize social media? A judge will soon decide.

CJ Griffin was recently interviewed by Fios 1 News television regarding a lawsuit she filed on behalf of a requestor seeking a list of users that various government officials have blocked from their official Facebook accounts.

The Record also covered the lawsuit.

We think the answer is obvious: if a government official conducts official government business on a social media account (such as updating constituents on official ...

Today, PSWH secured an appellate victory for two long-term firm clients, Richard Rivera and Collene Wronko.

The case involved OPRA requests for records from the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office (MCPO) which related to an incident where police officers shot and killed a man outside his home in Old Bridge. Both Mr. Rivera and Ms. Wronko sought access to the 9-1-1 call of the incident, as well as other police records, such as CAD reports and Standard Operating Procedures. Their requests were denied.

After lawsuits were filed, MCPO eventually released a redacted version of the 9-1-1 ...

Today, Pashman Stein Walder Hayden secured a victory for our client, Jennifer Coombs, in an OPRA case against the Borough of Westwood.

Ms. Coombs had requested payroll records from Westwood for all employees working for the Borough in 2017.  Westwood responded to Ms. Coombs' request by providing a payroll report, but redacting the names of numerous employees from it. Westwood stated that the redacted names were of minor employees who worked in the summer recreation program and that they were entitled to privacy.  After Ms. Coombs objected, Westwood released a new version of the report ...

Last week, the Appellate Division issued a published decision that is very important to transparency.  While the court's analysis of its standard of review over GRC decisions will excite appellate attorneys, it is the more substantive portion of the court's decision that grabbed our attention.

The case is Conley v. N.J. Dep’t of Corrections, ___ N.J. Super. ___ (App. Div. Jan. 12, 2018), and it involves an OPRA request that was filed by Kevin Conley, an inmate at the New Jersey State Prison.

Mr. Conley's OPRA request sought “monthly remedy statistical reports” that were required ...

Last week we discussed Exception 1 to OPRA’s personnel records exemption, which permits you to file an OPRA request for a public employee’s “name, title, position, salary, payroll record, length of service, date of separation and the reason therefor, and the amount and type of any pension received shall be a government record.”  This week, we explore Exception 2.

Exception 2 provides that: “personnel or pension records of any individual shall be accessible when required to be disclosed by another law, when disclosure is essential to the performance of official duties of a ...

Yesterday, the Supreme Court of New Jersey ruled in a split decision that security camera footage is not accessible under the Open Public Records Act (OPRA).

About the Case

The case is Patricia Gilleran v. Township of Bloomfield.  Ms. Gilleran* requested video footage from a security camera placed on the outside of town hall, just above the mayor’s parking spot.  Bloomfield denied her request, citing two of OPRA’s security-related provisions that exempt:

emergency or security information or procedures for any buildings or facility which, if disclosed, would jeopardize ...

The following article was posted on Northjersey.com on November 9, 2016 edition. It describes an argument before the New Jersey Supreme Court in one of the most consequential Open Public Records Act cases in State history. Our partner Sam Samaro is lead counsel for North Jersey Media Group and our firm spearheaded the appeal.

In enacting OPRA, the Legislature created two exemptions for police records.  The first exemption is the “ongoing investigation exemption.” N.J.S.A. 47:1A-3(a).  For that exemption to apply, an investigation must be ongoing and the police agency must prove that release of the records would be “inimical to the public interest.”   Even if the police do prove that releasing the records while the investigation is ongoing would be harmful, ultimately the records must be released after the investigation concludes.

OPRA’s other exemption, the “criminal investigatory ...

Several of Pashman Stein’s OPRA cases have been covered extensively by the press lately. Here is a rundown of the coverage.

McClimate v. Cumberland County

The Daily Journal has covered McClimate v. Cumberland County, a case where Pashman Stein has filed a suit on behalf of a retired county employee who seeks records pertaining to her insurance coverage.  Despite repeated requests that the county provide the actual cost sheet that Horizon Blue Cross gave the county, the county instead insisted on providing only a summary chart that it created.  Ms. McClimate seeks the actual cost ...

The following article was authored by Pashman Stein Partner Sam Samaro and appeared in the New Jersey Law Journal on October 29, 2015.

In March of 1991, a Los Angeles resident by the name of George Holliday noticed some commotion outside his apartment. He grabbed a camcorder, went out onto his balcony and shot the now iconic footage of Rodney King being beaten by the police. The resulting prosecution of the officers involved occurred because, and only because, the incident happened to take place within eyeshot of a citizen with a video camera. At the time, videotaped evidence of police ...

While overwhelmingly most agencies accept emailed or faxed requests or have an online portal to submit OPRA requests, there are a handful of agencies that do not. The Government Records Council (GRC) recently ruled that the refusal to accept at least one form of electronically submitted requests violates OPRA.

On September 29, 2015, the GRC ruled in Russo v. City of East Orange (Essex), GRC Complaint No. 2014-430, that “the City’s policy of banning submission of OPRA requests electronically represents an unreasonable obstacle on access.” In its decision, the GRC recounted ...

Numerous media entities have joined in an amicus brief filed by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, New Jersey Press Association, and ACLU of New Jersey in support of North Jersey Media Group’s Motion for Leave to Appeal to the Supreme Court in the case North Jersey Media Group v. Twp. of Lyndhurst, 441 N.J. Super. 70, 112-13 (App. Div. 2015).  Pashman Stein represents Plaintiff in this case, which has drawn national attention due to the Appellate Division’s holding which significantly limited the public’s right of access to police records.    

We have blogged before about a public agency’s requirement under the Open Public Meetings Act (OPMA) to make its meeting minutes “promptly” available to the public.  Our courts have held that minutes must be made available within two weeks after a public meeting or, at a minimum, at least 48-hours prior to the next meeting.  Those who regularly file requests for meeting minutes, however, are well aware that overwhelmingly public agencies fail to meet this timeline.  Indeed, many, if not most, public agencies are months behind on releasing minutes to the public.

One such agency is ...

We close Sunshine Week by featuring Jennifer A. Borg, Esq.

Ms. Borg is General Counsel and Vice President of North Jersey Media Group, publisher of The Record.  She is a recognized authority in First Amendment and open governance matters, particularly as they affect newspapers, and has recently served as Chair of the New Jersey Press Association.  She also has litigated numerous OPRA lawsuits with successful results.  Ms. Borg was featured in the ABA Journal (July 2014) for her expertise in OPRA and public records access issues.  Pashman Stein regularly serves as co-counsel with North ...

Today’s Sunshine Week profile features Rich Rivera, a police practices expert who uses OPRA to monitor police misconduct and the use of force by police officers on citizens.  Mr. Rivera is the Chairman of the Latino Leadership Alliance of New Jersey’s Civil Rights Protection Project, which addresses the community’s needs relating to police services and police interactions. He is a former Board Member of the ACLU of New Jersey, where he co-authored the report “The Crisis Inside Police Internal Affairs.”  Pashman Stein has litigated several cases on Mr. Rivera’s behalf.

Today’s Sunshine Week profile focuses on Pat Gilleran, a client for whom Pashman Stein has litigated many OPRA matters.  Pat is an open government and animal rights activist.  Pat’s litigation has been instrumental in forcing non-profit business improvement districts to comply with OPRA’s provisions.  Presently, Pashman Stein is defending an appeal on Pat’s behalf relating to video footage from a surveillance camera outside the Bloomfield Municipal Building. While the trial court ruled in Pat’s favor and held that the footage was subject to OPRA, Bloomfield has refused ...

Continuing with our Sunshine Week theme, today’s blog focuses on Harry Scheeler.  Recently, CJ Griffin of Pashman Stein secured a victory on Mr. Scheeler’s behalf against the Office of the Governor, which had denied access to RSVP lists for those attending Governor Christie’s Town Halls.

Interview with Harry Scheeler:

1. When and how did you initially become interested in the open government movement?

I first became interested in open government as a teenager. In the early 1990s the police department in my hometown was given cell phones for the purpose of calling judges for ...

On February 4, 2015, CJ Griffin of Pashman Stein secured a victory for Harry Scheeler, a prominent open-government activist, in a case against the Office of the Governor which alleged violations of the Open Public Records Act.

In September, Mr. Scheeler requested RSVP lists from Governor Chris Christie’s “town hall” meetings.  The Governor’s Office denied the request, stating that the lists could not be released based on the privacy provisions of OPRA and Executive Order 26.

Mr. Scheeler filed suit in the Superior Court, alleging an OPRA violation.  After litigation, the ...

Recently, Pashman Stein secured a victory in the case North Jersey Media Group v. Township of Lyndhurst, et al.  Below are links to media covering this important decision, in which the Hon. Peter E. Doyne, A.J.S.C., ruled that the Defendant public agencies violated OPRA and compelled the Defendants to produce records relating to the police shooting of a man in Lyndhurst in September 2014.

http://www.nj.com/bergen/index.ssf/2015/01/judge_orders_release_of_records_in_fatal_bergen_co.html

As it appeared on New Jersey Law Journal, January 13, 2015 in regards to Pashman Stein's representation.

Police records related to the shooting of a black man who was killed by officers after he allegedly rammed them with an SUV must be released to the public immediately and without redaction, a New Jersey state trial judge has ruled, citing the heightened need for public access to information in the wake of the killings of African-American males by police in Ferguson, Mo., and Staten Island, N.Y.

“The defendants’ refusals to disclose and utter lack of cooperation was undoubtedly ...

Whether a public agency can charge for records provided in response to an OPRA request depends on the circumstances.  There are important guidelines to remember.

• Electronic copies of records should ordinarily be free of charge, so most requestors seek them in that format. When making your request, simply ask that the records be emailed to you.

• If a requestor wants a hard copy of a record, the public agency may charge 5 cents per letterhead size copy and 7 cents per legal paper size copy. A public agency may not charge more unless they can prove that their “actual costs” are higher.

• If the ...

Over the past few years, New Jersey courts have expanded the definition of “public agency” under the Open Public Records Act (“OPRA”) so that it covers more than what is traditionally thought to be a government agency (i.e. municipalities and state agencies).  Through a series of cases, our courts have made it clear that non-profit corporations can be subject to OPRA if they serve as an “instrumentality” of a public agency.

Last week, the Hon. Judge Peter E. Doyne held that the Rutherford Downtown Partnership (“RDP”), a non-profit organization that manages the ...