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(Des Moines) The Iowa Public Information Board has accepted one public records complaint against the city of Sidney and rejected another.

During its monthly meeting Thursday afternoon, the IPIB officially accepted a complaint filed by City Councilman Don Benedict against the city. The complaint was filed after Benedict sent a public records request to the city on June 16th, seeking city email communications between Mayor Ken Brown and Riley Christie, Brown and RC Tree Service and Brown and former City Attorney Clint Fichter. Brown responded to the request, saying he would not comply with the request because he is conducting an official investigation of the city. Brown also argued that as mayor, his emails are confidential and that pulling them from a city server would be a violation of his fourth amendment rights. Speaking to the IPIB, City Attorney Bri Sorensen says the city has attempted to comply with the request.

"The city has made every effort to gain the mayor's compliance in a cooperative manner," said Sorensen. "He has refused and has threatened litigation against the city. He did indicate in an email to myself and I believe the council that if the Iowa Public Information Board would order him to do so, he would comply with providing the emails. Despite having received the suggested order from the board, the mayor has double down on his refusal."

In July, the Sidney City Council voted to comply with the request and access Browns emails to respond to the public records request in accordance with the citys email usage policy. Sorensen says the city is seeking assistance with complying to the request to avoid violating Iowa's public records laws.

"I am concerned about the city's ability to comply with the request, because it appears that many emails have been deleted," said Sorensen. "I would request from the board continued assistance in this matter to help us to comply as the city has attempted to do so, to provide us some guidance and to assist in mediating or providing services to help us to comply, including identifying emails that were deleted after the public information request was made. I think there is potentially some intentionality in destruction of public record in response to the request that was made."

Now that the request has been accepted, the IPIB can work with the city to reach an informal resolution to the case.

In another case involving the city, the IPIB rejected a complaint filed by Brown against the city. Brown alleges that he made several public records requests for numerous communications and employee records. The city responded with a timeline for processing the request and with an estimate of the cost of procuring the records. Under Iowa Code Chapter 22, public entities are allowed to charge reasonable expenses for producing the requested records.

"It is an intensive request that he has made," said Sorensen. "It will be very demanding on city staff to pull all of those records. Upon payment of the reasonable expense, we certainly will comply. I don't believe there's been any violation on the part of the city. The city has met its obligation and made every effort to cooperate and provide Mr. Brown the information that he's requested."

Under the complaint, Brown claims the fees should be waived since he is making his request in his official capacity as mayor. Following discussion, the IPIB dismissed the case, stating that the city has fulfilled its obligations under Chapter 22.

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