In the Case of an Application by the City of Vancouver
for Authorization to Disregard Requests from [the respondent]
under Section 43 of the Freedom of Information and
Protection of Privacy Act (the Act)

I have reviewed the application of the City of Vancouver under section 43 of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (the Act) for authorization to disregard requests made by [the respondent] under section 5 of the Act.

Section 43 gives me the power to authorize a public body to disregard requests under section 5 that, because of their repetitious or systematic nature, would unreasonably interfere with the operations of the public body, in this case the City of Vancouver.

Since the purpose of the Act is to make government bodies more accountable to the public by giving the public a right of access to records, authorization to disregard should be given sparingly and only in obviously meritorious cases. Authorizations under section 43 should not be seen as a routine option for public bodies to avoid their obligations under the legislation.

I have carefully reviewed the submissions of the City of Vancouver and the response of [the respondent], and find, on the basis of the following, that [his/her] requests are repetitious in nature and unreasonably interfere with the operations of the City:

1. The City of Vancouver states that [the respondent] is its employee. Between 1988 and 1994 the City made all reasonable efforts to reply to [his/her] requests for access to information under its Freedom of Information By-law for records related to the City's employment and hiring practices. It has provided me with a detailed chronology of these efforts and estimates that this involved "hundreds of hours." See the affidavits of Dennis Back and Tom Zworski.

2. The City submits that [the respondent] "is using the Act to harass the City in retaliation for decisions related to several job competitions" in which [he/she] was a candidate. (See Order No. 110-1996, June 5, 1996, pp. 5, 6)

3. The [respondent] has made six requests for access to the City under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. These again concerned its employment and hiring practices. The City estimates that it has spent in excess of two hundred hours responding to these requests, because of the size of the requests and their complexity. Three requests, for example, dealing with the City's employment and hiring practices, included 202 individual queries. The burden of dealing with this particular respondent includes "the heavy workload associated with ... the steady stream of correspondence from the [respondent] and [his/her] repeated requests for review [to my Office] on even the most trivial and obvious issues."

I agree with the City's submission that [the respondent] has abused [his/her] rights under the Act. See Order No. 98-1996, April 19, 1996. The City even suggests that [he/she] may now be attempting to circumvent this Order against [him/her] by splitting [his/her] access requests into parts in order to avoid fees that I previously decided were appropriate.

4. The City makes the appropriate point that its one manager devoted to Information and Privacy issues has had to devote a disproportionate amount of time to dealing with [the respondent], which has unreasonably interfered with this person's performance of related duties and responsibilities under the Act, including providing advice regarding access and privacy issues, ensuring compliance with the Act, the development of access and privacy policies and training, and responding to public inquiries.

5. I further agree with the City's submission that [the respondent]'s actions "are bringing the Act into disrepute and that requiring the City to respond to [his/her] requests and appeals undermines the legitimacy of the Act in the eyes of the staff in departments affected by the [respondent]'s requests."

6. The City states that it has responded to other access requests from [the respondent] and is not trying to limit [his/her] ability to exercise such rights under the Act, except in relation to the issue of employment and hiring practices, which have been dealt with exhaustively and repeatedly since 1988.

Therefore, I authorize the City of Vancouver to disregard all past, present, and future requests from [the respondent] for records related to the City's hiring or employment practices, including records related to specific employment competitions.

October 22, 1997

David H. Flaherty
Commissioner