Opinion: Public records are public, period

Do the public officials directing Florida's state agencies think they are free to make up public records law as they go along? Do they think the public's statutory right to public records is subject to their discretion?

Apparently, the state Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles does.

For a little longer than a day, in the wake of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on Sept. 11, the department banned access to all state driving records. It then decided that certain records, such as those providing leads in the investigation of the terrorist attack, will be open to the public in an incomplete form, holding back information such as the license-holder's address. Bob Sanchez, a spokesman for the department, said the move was in response to a request by federal law enforcement agencies investigating the attacks and asking that the records of people of certain nationalities not be released. "There was a fear that reporters were getting (to the neighbors and associates of the suspects) before the gendarme," he explained."

But there is no authority in law for the department to accede to law enforcement's request. There is a public records exemption for "active criminal intelligence information and active criminal investigation information," and the department is basing its action on that exemption. But attorneys familiar with public records law say that the exemption only applies to records generated by the investigation, not records sought by it.

Driving records are quintessentially public because they identify those residents who may legitimately drive and their driving record. Limiting public inspection of those records is the equivalent of limiting access to criminal records. And while current federal law does give individuals the option of keeping private their address, Social Security number and other aspects of their driving record, here the department is acting unilaterally to do so, without the request or permission of the subject.

Of course, the reason reporters have been seeking driving records is that many of the suspects in the terrorist hijackings were reportedly licensed Florida drivers. As many as 15 of the 19 people identified as having participated in the hijackings lived in Florida within the last three years, and as many as 13 obtained Florida drivers licenses or state identification cards. Investigators don't want citizens knowing anything more than what law enforcement is willing to disclose, but the public has a right to information about the men who carried out the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history and how they lived among us. The department says it has taken this action in response to a national emergency. But what about the law? It doesn't give the department authority to cherry-pick which public records should be public.

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