The North Dakota Attorney General's office has issued a summary opinion concerning a matter involving an open records request that was directed at the Child Support Section of the North Dakota Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). This official opinion concludes that DHHS did not violate the specific provisions of state open records law, identified as North Dakota Century Code (N.D.C.C.) § 44-04-18, in its handling of a particular request for public information.
Richard W. Vengels III was the individual who formally requested this opinion from the Attorney General's office. Mr. Vengels III's submission was made in accordance with N.D.C.C. § 44-04-21.1, a statutory provision that specifically enables citizens to seek such legal interpretations and reviews from the state's top legal authority. His petition to the Attorney General's office explicitly centered on an allegation that the Child Support Section of DHHS had failed to provide him with certain records. He specifically asserted that DHHS was in possession of these records and that they were directly responsive to an open records request he had previously submitted to the department.
In response to the Attorney General's inquiry regarding the alleged open records violation, the Department of Health and Human Services presented its official account of the situation. DHHS unequivocally stated that it did not have any records responsive to Mr. Vengels III's initial request existing within its possession. Furthermore, the department clearly maintained that it did not withhold any responsive records, as its position was that such records simply did not exist for them to provide to the requester.
The Attorney General's office is bound by state statute to base its official opinion on any alleged violation of open records law strictly upon the facts as presented and given by the public entity involved in the complaint. This particular legal mandate ensures that the determination of compliance is made based directly on the agency's stated position and its own account of the records. Therefore, in accordance with this specific requirement, the Attorney General's office proceeded to evaluate the entire situation using only the information that was provided by DHHS.
Based on the entirety of the facts that were provided by the Department of Health and Human Services, the Attorney General's office ultimately rendered its official opinion. The formal conclusion of the opinion explicitly states that DHHS did not violate the open records law in this specific case. This determination was directly predicated on the department's clear representation that it did not possess any records that were responsive to Mr. Vengels III's original request. The stated absence of such records, according to the Attorney General's summary opinion, meant that no violation of the open records law could have possibly occurred regarding the withholding of information from the requester. This opinion serves to clarify the legal standing of the Child Support Section of DHHS in this specific instance concerning the public records request.
