California Surveyors Forums

Attached please find some more PRA law. Wikipedia cites CBS-Block as a lead case.

Mike,
Thanks for the Public Records Act references. I am very interested in this subject.

What's your opinion regarding agencies needing to give access to digital topo, GIS utility data, and georeferenced ortho aerial photos?

Is there a difference between the digital data and hardcopies? I would like to ask for the digital files from the agency if this is part of the Public Records Act.

The City of San Marcos charges a hefty fee for their digital ortho photos and 2 foot contours. They charge more than it would cost to have a typical 4 acre site flown creating full planimetrics topo (the City doesn’t have this).

Demand they give it to you. Check out the attached. I posted some of this material a while ago. Otherwise I ould have reposted. Make the DEMAND and then county to 10 (days).

Check out Santa Clara County.

Thanks again Mike! Regarding “direct costs” the Santa Clara County case says:

"For electronic records, however, the statute allows an agency to recover specified ancillary costs in either of two cases: (1) when it must “produce a copy of an electronic record” between “regularly scheduled intervals” of production, or (2) when compliance with the request for an electronic record “would require data compilation, extraction, or programming to produce the record.” (§ 6253.9, subd. (b)(1), (2); see 88 Ops.Cal.Atty.Gen., supra, at p.164.) Under those circumstances, the agency may charge “the cost to construct a record, and the cost of programming and computer services necessary to produce a copy of the record….” (§ 6253.9, subd. (b).)

This sounds like the agency can charge the amount of time and materials needed to compile, extract, or produce the data. I’m guessing the time and materials would be billed at cost with no markup for profits. Am I understanding this correctly?

I sent a demand to Riverside County and they charged me $198.00. Don't let them inflate any costs here. How long can it take to put a CD in the computer and press copy? The information I got did take some time as I grabbed all their GIS data. Remember this is your right and it is the law. I always act accordingly.

Good luck.

Ben:

That's why they got hammered in the recent lawsuit for this very cause.

They're not charging huge now...by court order!

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Marin county used to charge $400 for a set of CDS of all their recorded maps.
I picke up a a set for around $21. Believe me they were not happy to hand out the copies for that price. they claimed to be looking for ways to get a greater fee. They compile and udate every yeare for their use, so a copy is really just the cost of a CD....

I forget which City in SD county it was, but to get their GPS/BM info it was on a RS and the cost was over $100 (bonded blueprinter plus pickup and return and 2 day wait). I finally got the guy to let me look at their copy and hand copied the data I needed, 1 bm + 2 more in case the first was gone.

Glad to see this monopoly price gouging is not agreeable to the courts.

Ventura County mapping records cost me about $25. Consisted of 4 or 5 DVDs.

"What's your opinion regarding agencies needing to give access to ... georeferenced ortho aerial photos?"

Note that some agencies license their aerials from a commercial provider and are prevented by contract from distributing them in digital format.

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See Post 3 above.

There is an attachment that as generated by the City Attorney of San Diego.

From which I quote:

"Absent some other legal prohibition upon their release provided by the vendor, there is no authority to withhold access."

Simple possession and use of a "writing" by a public agency isn't enough to make it a public record. Were that so, none of us would have to buy AutoCAD -- we'd just demand that our local agencies provide us with digital copies of the software they bought.

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Ken,
I think I got a glimpse of your letter to Santa Cruz County.
Would you be willing to post a copy of your letter?

Regards,
Clark E. Stoner

Thanks Ken and Mike for creating this example letter, well done!

Yeah, ditto that!

Thanks Ken and Mike.

Big Cheers!

Wants to charge me $1500 and then put me on a quarterly update plan for an additional $150/quarter.

Have a look at the attached. Obviously they have a system set up. So are they gouging us?

Hmmm...

Clark: That sounds like an opportunity for th elocal CLSA Chapter to step up, but the disks and the updates and make them available to CLSA members. Sounds like a great opportunity for a backhanded smack down and a great new benefit to CLSA members to boot!

Get on it, will you?

BTW - might be headed to Monterey next Friday for a quick monitoring well survey. Capitola would sort of on the way back. You up for a latish lunch/early happy hour?

LS_8750 wrote:Wants to charge me $1500 and then put me on a quarterly update plan for an additional $150/quarter.

Have a look at the attached. Obviously they have a system set up. So are they gouging us?

Must be nice to be a monopoly.

I really like Ian's idea.

I wanted to bring this thread back up to the top and ask a few questions. Has anyone asked the county of San Diego for all of their record maps? I'm about to ask the City of Oceanside for their topo and aerial photos. Do I need to say why I want this info? Besides the issue of the agencies' license agreement with the source of the topo and aerials, would there be other reasons why the agency would not give this data?

With google earth why purchase aerial pics from the city?

The aerial from the city is georeferenced to their topo. Both are higher quality than google.