It’s a well-settled rule that an OPRA request requiring research by the custodian is invalid, but requestors nevertheless keep filing these kind of requests. In an opinion issued today, the Appellate Division, as it has done on many occasions, upheld the denial of a request on this basis. Carter v. Dept. of Community Affairs (unpublished).

The request in this case was a textbook example of an invalid research request. The requestor sought

“copies of any and all ‘Notice of Docketing’ records issued by the New Jersey Superior Court, Appellate Division, resulting from an appeal (pursuant to N.J.S.A. 40A:9-22.91) of any final [agency] decision of the Local Finance Board [(LFB)] from August 9, 2011 through August 9, 2016.”

The Appellate Division agreed with the GRC that this is not a valid request. Because the request did not identify specific cases, it required the custodian to find out from other agencies what cases might be covered, locate these case files, and then analyze the case files to attempt to figure out if they contained relevant records. OPRA simply does not require records custodians to perform such research and analysis.