Attorney General Opinions
Relating to County Government

2006 Records

Tennessee’s Public Records Act requires that a records custodian make any public records in his or her custody available for public inspection during normal business hours unless state law provides otherwise. If a public record contains confidential information, the custodian must disclose the record with the confidential information redacted. If requested, copies of public records must be provided but the custodian may charge a reasonable fee per copy to cover the cost of producing the copy. A citizen is not required to appear personally if he can adequately describe the documents requested so the custodian knows which documents are to be copied. The custodian is not required to manually sort through paper records to compile information from separate records or to compile or collect statistics, but records kept in electronic format have a different standard. Where information is in electronic format and can be extracted in the format requested by writing a computer program, the records custodian must produce the information as requested if the requestor is willing to pay the costs incurred in disclosing the information. The act does not provide any penalties, but a court may assess reasonable litigation costs, including attorneys’ fees, against a nondisclosing governmental entity if the court finds a willful failure to disclose public records. Opinion No. 06-069 (April 12, 2006).