In National Lawyers' Guild v. City of Hayward, published September 28, 2018, the First District Court of Appeal, Division 3 reversed a trial court's issuance of a writ of administrative mandate directing the respondent city to refund to the petitioner payments the petitioner made for copies of police body cam video footage the city produced in response to a California Public Records request. The city charged the petitioner for the cost of city employees reviewing the videos and using Windows Movie Maker to redact material exempt from the CPRA on privacy or security grounds. The city sought the cost under a portion of the CPRA, Government Code section 6253.9, subdivision (b)(2). The statute requires the requester to bear the cost of producing a copy of an electronic record if the request would require "extraction" to produce the record. The trial court concluded that the phrase "extraction" does not apply to redaction of an electronic record, but only to extraction necessary to produce the record.
The appellate court disagreed. Concluding that the statute's language is ambiguous, the court reviewed the legislative history. It noted a concern that the cost of producing only portions of electronic records would exceed the cost of redacting paper documents. The court concluded that "extraction" as used in the statute includes the cost of redacting exempt portions of electronic documents before producing them under the CPRA.
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