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Larry B. Dendy
As part of the ongoing reorganization of UGA’s legal affairs office, President Michael F. Adams has assigned responsibility for administering the Georgia Open Records Act to the University Communications office.
Beginning Aug. 1, all requests for materials and records held by university offices should be filed with University Communications in the Alumni House, says Tom Jackson, executive director of university communications.
“We intend to make the university’s compliance with open records requests user-friendly, non-adversarial and open,” says Jackson.
The transfer was recommended by Jackson and Jere Morehead, acting executive director of legal affairs. Adams has directed Morehead to review all functions of the legal affairs office as part of his decision to move the office into a support role for the president’s office.
As a state agency, UGA falls under Georgia’s open records law and most UGA records, with a few specific exemptions, are public information. Requests most commonly come from news media, but can be made by any individual or organization.
Courts have ruled that public records include documents, maps, photographs, videotapes, handwritten notes, personnel files, performance evaluations, student evaluations of academic courses and e-mail messages.
Major exemptions are for medical and veterinary records; trade secrets and information of a proprietary nature; certain research data that has not been published, patented or otherwise disseminated; records governed by federal confidentiality rules, such as student educational records; and records related to pending investigations.
When a UGA unit receives a request for access to records, University Communications will work with the unit head to determine which records are covered by the law, Jackson says. University Communications will consult with the legal affairs office on requests for which the law is ambiguous or unclear.
The university must make an initial response to any request for information within three business days, so it is essential that all requests be forwarded immediately to University Communications, Jackson says.
“The three-day clock starts when a request is received, not when it is relayed to our office,” Jackson says. “It is the responsibility of department and unit heads to assure there is no delay in this notification to University Communications.”
A brochure describing procedures for complying with open records requests has been distributed to all unit heads, Jackson says.
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