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Document
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MO-1453
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Institution/HIC
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Township of Terrace Bay
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Summary
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NATURE OF THE APPEAL: The appellant submitted a request to the Township of Terrace Bay (the Township) under the Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (the Act ) for access to a copy of a complaint letter written to the Town Councillors by a local business owner (the affected person). The letter concerned an incident involving the appellant which occurred at the affected person's place of business. The Town Council received the letter at its regular meeting of council on Monday, October 23, 2000. The Township notified the affected person pursuant to section 21(1) and asked for her views regarding disclosure of the letter to the appellant. In refusing to consent to disclosure of her personal information to the appellant the affected person indicated that the incident was a private matter and that she did not wish for it to go any further. She expressed concern that disclosure might result in a confrontation with the appellant. After considering the affected person's views, the Township denied access to the letter on the basis of the discretionary exemption in section 38(b) (invasion of privacy) of the Act . The appellant appealed this decision, stating: The letter that I am requesting was written to my employer about me demanding that I be disciplined for actions that had no bearing on my work as a municipal employee. Besides being a personal issue between the complainant and myself the entire letter is grossly exaggerated and borders on slander. I have read the letter myself, my supervisor ... showed it to me. My employer replied to the complainant (as attached) and did not act on her request. However, I feel that if this person has the right to lie and embarrass me to my employer then I should at least be entitled to have a copy of it ... This whole situation has been blown out of proportion. I was just stating my opinion as a customer about the service provided ... I have a right as a customer to state my opinion about service provided. Just because I am a Municipal employee in a small town, this person feels she has the right to complain about my behaviour outside of my job. My employer should never have even seen that letter and they wouldn't have if I was employed anywhere else. Mediation was not successful and this appeal was moved into inquiry. I decided to seek submissions from the Township and the affected person, initially. I sent a Notice of Inquiry setting out the facts and issues in this appeal to both of these parties. The affected person submitted representations in response. The Township wrote to this office indicating that it wishes to rely on the information it provided to the mediator, and that it would not be submitting any further representations. After reviewing all of the information provided by both the affected person and the Township, I contacted the Township for further information relating to the meeting of the council on October 23, 2000. I then sent a Notice of Inquiry to the appellant in which I summarized the representations submitted by the affected person and the results of my queries to the Township. The appellant submitted representations which I subsequently sent, in their entirety, to the affected person for reply. The affected person submitted representations in reply. RECORD: The record at issue is a one-page letter dated October 12, 2000 to the attention of the Town Councillors signed by the affected person. DISCUSSION: PERSONAL INFORMATION/INVASION OF PRIVACY Under section 2(1), "personal information" is defined, in part, to mean recorded information about an identifiable individual, including the individual's name where it appears with other personal information relating to the individual or where disclosure of the name would reveal other personal information about the individual [paragraph (h)]. Personal information also includes: (d) the address, telephone number, fingerprints or blood type of the individual, (e) the personal opinions or views of the individual except if they relate to another individual, (g) the views or opinions of another individual about the individual. In the letter the affected person sent to the Township Councillors, she describes a situation that occurred at her place of business involving the appellant and one of her employees. She states her views about the appellant's actions, her views and expectations regarding the level of acceptable behaviour of municipal employees (and the appellant in particular) and her perception of the impact of this incident on her personally and on her business. It is apparent that the record contains primarily the affected person's views and opinions regarding the appellant and, in accordance with paragraphs (e) and (g) of the definition of personal information, this should qualify as only the personal information of the appellant. However, in the context in which the letter is written, I find that it also contains the affected person's views and opinions regarding the impact of the incident on herself, and as such, contains her personal information. The letter also contains a small amount of information about one of the affected person's employees in that it refers to her as being involved in an accident at her place of business. In the circumstances, I find that this qualifies as the employee's personal information as well. In my view, much of the information in the record pertaining to the affected person is not reasonably severable from that pertaining only to the appellant. On the other hand, once the name of the employee is removed from the record, the remaining portions do not identify her in any way. Therefore, I find that the balance of the letter does not contain the personal information of the employee. I will consider below, whether the disclosure of the employee's name would constitute an unjustified invasion of her privacy. Section 36(1) of the Act gives individuals a general right of access to their own personal information held by a government body. Section 38 provides a number of exceptions to this general right of access. Under section 38(b) of the Act , where a record contains the personal information of both the appellant and other individuals and the institution determines that the disclosure of the information would
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Legislation
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Subject Index
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Published
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Jul 09, 2001
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Type
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Order
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2013
Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario. All Rights Reserved.
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