A little noticed but potentially significant (for public records researchers) California Attorney General opinion was released a week ago. The opinion upends the almost universal interpretation of the Public Records Act by county Assessors pertaining to disseminating property addresses on the Internet.

If you go to any California county Assessor online public inquiry you’ll see an explanation similar to this on the Stanislaus County site:

California Government Code 6254.21 states that “No state or local agency shall post the home address or telephone number of any elected or appointed official on the Internet without first obtaining the written permission of the individual.”

Therefore the agencies don’t reveal anyone’s address.The law seems to be hewed to regarding the real property addresses for public officials, right? Not according to the AG. Deputy Attorney General Daniel Stone says the common interpretation is wrong and isn’t what the legislature intended.

As a practical matter, we believe that a broad and overly literal reading of section 6254.21(a) would lead to unworkable results. Some public agencies…might conclude that they were forced to refrain from making any property-related database accessible to any internet technology, no matter how secure or limited the network, due to the possibility that the data could contain home information of public officials. Other public agencies… might conclude that they were forced to review and redact their databases… Such an identification process would be difficult, time consuming, and inevitably incomplete. Furthermore, the resulting revised property databases… would no longer be comprehensive and would therefore be of diminished utility to users. We are hesitant to conclude that the Legislature could have intended such impractical results.

Simply put, the 1998 law was “intended to prevent public agencies from posting on their public websites any list or directory of public officials’ home addresses and telephone numbers, without first obtaining each official’s written permission to be included in the listing.” In other words, government agencies can’t construct a list of names and residential addresses of government employees and put that on their Internet sites.

Giving the Assessors permission to reconsider their ban on including addresses and names in their online databases, Stone states, simply:

Indeed, we believe that if the Legislature had in fact contemplated a comprehensively literal application of section 6254.21(a), that intention would have been more clearly reflected in the statute.

Give a kindly call to your local Assessor and ask her/him what changes they anticipate making in their Internet access in light of this opinion. What did the Assessor say?

Search by name or partial name to find disciplinary actions by the California Department of Corporations against employees of escrow agents. Results provide full name, date of action and the restriction imposed.

This database contains listing of individuals that, from January 1, 1991 to the present, have been censured, suspended, or barred by the California Department of Corporations pursuant to Financial Code section 17423 of the Escrow Law.

The free real property databases are extending their geographical coverage and the types of features that delight investigators. Zillow has a fly-on-the-cyber-wall feature that will be appreciated by lawyers and investigators: number of total and recent month page views for a particular property. Find it at the bottom of the “Home Facts” detail page. The last sales date and sales price is available on both Zillow and Cyberhomes, but I found the data more often on Zillow. This site will also show a list of all houses on a specified street, with a link to the home details.

Cyberhomes has a more modern look, but if you’re not especially interested in comparables, Zillow probably offers more for an investigator. Cyberhomes does have an easy to find neighborhood snapshot of census-derived demographic data. The comps and photos, available at both sites, give a quick sense of the neighborhood economic profile.

Free registration at PropertyShark will get you 6 free lookups a day that return property owner name and last sales price. Unfortunately, the county Assessors’ Web sites often don’t provide the owner name, even though it’s a public record. PropertyShark may not have this for all addresses, so you might want to use the free owner lookup at CourthouseDirect.

View your selected slice of real estate on a map at Live, Google, Yahoo, MapQuest or TerraServer at PropertyShark. There’s also a link to the Department of Justice, National Sex Offender Public Web Site.

A few reminders: Not all regions or addresses are included in any of the free sites, which is true for fee-based databases, as well. Some Web sites are missing large geographical areas or addresses on a street. Also, if you’re searching property records as part of an investigation, utilize multiple sources - free and fee-based - and dig into the Assessor and Recorder supplied records. Check their online and onsite records. There are differences.

I wrote about PropertyShark and did another posting, also in 2006, which generated a number of valuable additions in the comments.

How have you used real property sites in investigations?

The New York Court of Appeals supported the private real property data vendor, Data Tree, in its quest to secure an electronic version of property records. New York Court of Appeals Rejects Reporters Committee Rationale, Access Reports, December 20, 2007.

The Minnesota Association of County Officers is seeking the participation of Minnesota county Recorders to create an online marriage index database.

Vermont real property tax forms are now sent to Vermont town clerks rather than the homeowner, which makes this form a public record. These documents list the amount of tax reductions given to homeowners based on income, enabling one to estimate a household’s income.

Complaints by residents in Oregon has lead to the removal of some property owner’s names from PortlandMaps, the city’s online mapping program of assessor’s data and building permits. Portland offers a vague explanation for the decision to allow a search by address only.

Ohio media outlets may have to add a requirement to the standard job description: must have photographic memory. That is, if they want to peruse particular public records which cannot be copied. That’s the law in Ohio. The opinion of the Ohio Attorney General adds absurdity to confusion in his assertion that reporters can inspect the gun permit owner lists kept by the Sheriffs’ offices but are not allowed to write anything down. Keep your eyes peeled for a clarifying law, sure to be stupider than the first.

Meanwhile, the Wisconsin Attorney General has issued an opinion that may make police agency’s records more available to the public. The AG stated that a 1991 state Supreme Court ruling exempting from the open records law district attorney files does not apply to police reports. A police spokesperson objected, claiming that open access would give a defense attorney “tactical advantage over a prosecutor who has not yet examined the police reports”, according to this story. Will someone make a list of all the arguments public agencies have offered for keeping public records out of our hands?

It had to happen. Newspapers that publish public records databases have been attracting more viewers to their sites. I don’t know if this translates into subscribers or other ways papers make money, but the Memphis Daily News is taking the direct approach, selling access to Tennessee public records. The paper has partnered with the Chandler Reports, which sells property profiles and business filings. There are no free searches, although they do the usual gimmick of presenting search fields but then require a fee to see any results.

One interesting feature that I haven’t seen other newspapers pick up monitors new public records filings then sends them to you in an email. This costs, too. The Watch Service charges $1 a month per tracked entity - a business, person or address - obtaining daily filings of property, bankruptcy and court records. Then an alert is emailed to you when a record is located. It’s unclear how detailed this is. Also, the service only covers Shelby and DeSoto counties.

Oh, the paper did just add a free crime report database. Search by address to find crime incidents. If you want to receive email alerts you’ll have to subscribe!

Similar and more extensive records may be available for free from the government agencies that generate them. Perhaps some of my readers can enlighten us.

This is the only site I’ve seen that aggregates the indexes of Recorder documents of multiple counties. The Oklahoma County Clerk Public Records is a project of the Oklahoma county clerks in conjunction with Kellpro, which develops software applications for Oklahoma and Texas county and state agencies. Search across all 28 Oklahoma counties that are currently in this database by name. Registration is free but required to get online access to document images.

The well established may disappear overnight in the realm of online government records. Visitors to the Jefferson County, Alabama Probate Court online records search - the site for images of land records, personal property and probate recordings - were recently greeted by an unwelcome message.

Due to privacy concerns, this site is unavailable until further notice. Data is still available at the Jefferson County Probate offices.

A reporter alerted the county to the availability of Social Security numbers in some document images - mostly older UCC filings - which were not properly redacted. The site is completely down until all the SSNs can be removed.

California legislation that would have restored the public’s right to view police disciplinary information has apparently been derailed before being heard in the Assembly Public Safety Committee. The California Progress Report gives a detailed review.

The San Mateo County, California Court site has posted a Standing Order restricting personal data in court filings, in accordance with the California Rules of Court. Personal identifiers should be limited to the last 4 digits of the Social Security number, the year of birth, and initials for minor children.

Adoptees received some good news in a bill signed by the governor of Maine. Starting January 1, 2009 anyone adopted in Maine gains the right to their original birth certificate. Only 3 other states have unlocked adoption records that were formerly closed.

In the ever new species of state registries the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services has sprouted the Dangerous Dog Registry!

The Dangerous Dog Registry provides a mechanism for consumers to determine if dangerous dogs reside in their neighborhoods and for local animal control officials to post information about dogs that have been declared dangerous by the local court.

Courthouse Direct has added a free bankruptcy index search to its collection of free public records, which now include nationwide (sort of) real property, many Recorder indexes, and Texas marriage, divorce and death indexes.

Search the bankruptcy records by name, date, filing state, type of filing, city, state or the the last 4 digits in the Social Security number. The asterisk wildcard can be used after a partial first name. The results list returns the court location, full name of the party, the date of the filing and the filing type. The filing type is not very useful because it describes the subject (defendant 1 or 2 or “other”), not the nature of the court filing. Further details are available for a fee, or you can go to PACER, which is less costly. The through dates are not specified, except that the party search is complete starting in 2001. I found California cases in one jurisdiction from 1985. Other states had filings from the early 1990’s but most seemed to be from the 2000’s. Courthouse Direct bankruptcy data comes from the commercial service AACER, which does not have a free lookup.

One caution: The bankruptcy search only works in Internet Explorer!

Visit this federal government site for a glossary of bankruptcy terms.

The North Carolina Sex Offender Registry has added email notification and mapping. Search by partial name, city, county, address or physical coordinates to retrieve a list of offenders. Select a profile, then click on the mapping symbol. Expand the view to include registrants within a 1, 3 or 5 mile radius. Hover over the icon to view the other nearby registrants’ photos and addresses. Then request email notification whenever a sex offender is registered at an address within that radius. The search function also covers sex offenders who are incarcerated.

Montana driving record histories and vehicle license information can now be obtained from the State of Montana Web site. Both are only available with with an account, subject to a permissible reason, outlined in the subscriber agreement.

…Personal Information may be requested as a part of Agreed Data only for the following purposes:
A. By any insurer or insurance support organization in connection with claims
investigation activities, anti-fraud activities, rating, or underwriting.
B. In the normal course of business by a legitimate business or its agents,
employees or contractors:
1. To verify the accuracy of personal information submitted by the individual
who is the subject of the record to the business or its agents, employees
or contractors; and
2. If such information is not correct, to obtain the correct information, but only for the purposes of preventing fraud by pursuing legal remedies against, or recovering on a debt or security interest against an insured or applicant.
3. To verify vehicle information.
C. By an employer or its agent or insurer to obtain or verify information relating to a holder of a commercial driver’s license required under the Commercial Motor Vehicle Safety Act of 1986 (49 U.S.C. Part 383)
D. For use in connection with any civil, criminal, administrative, or arbitral
proceeding in any Federal, State, or local court or agency or before any selfregulatory
body, including the service of process…

[Via TVC]

Booking photos of those who are arrested but not charged or found not guilty must be removed from Web sites maintained by county Sheriff offices, according to an opinion issued by the Alabama Attorney General.

Plot parcels and geographic features on the Tucson Arizona Department of Transportation GIS parcel viewer. Search by address, real property owner name, name of school or intersection. Mastering the map functions can take some time if you’re not versed in the Autodesk program (which requires the Internet Explorer browser), so you might want to consult their map viewer guide. The easiest way to plot a parcel is to search by the owner name, address or parcel number from this page. Then select the link, “zoom to parcel”, which highlights the parcel on the map. Select “detail information” to link directly to permit history for that parcel and recorded documents.

Print and save maps with the features you specify. The Tucson Department of Transportation also produces other maps related to traffic and geographic land characteristics.