Kelleher, Christopher v. Brookfield, Town of - Town Clerk (SPR 20260313)

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts William Francis Galvin, Secretary of the Commonwealth Public Records Division Manza Arthur Supervisor of Records February 11, 2026 SPR26/0313 Michael P. Seery Town Clerk Town of Brookfield 6 Central Street Brookfield, MA 01506 Dear Mr. Seery: I have received the petition of Christopher Kelleher appealing the response of the Town of Brookfield (Town) to a request for public records. See G. L. c. 66, § 10A; see also 950 C.M.R. 32.08(1). On December 12, 2025, Mr. Kelleher requested “[a] search of the Town Administrator’s official email account(s) for emails sent or received during [an identified individual’s] tenure as Town Administrator that contain the keyword ‘crazy’ (not case- insensitive).” The Town initially responded on December 29, 2025 and January 6, 2026, providing a fee estimate. Previous Appeal This request was the subject of a previous appeal. See SPR26/0028 Determination of the Supervisor of Records (January 20, 2026). In my January 20th determination, I ordered the Town to revise its fee estimate or provide further explanation of how the fee estimate of $300.00 is consistent with G. L. c. 66, § 10(d). The Town responded on January 28, 2026, clarifying and revising its fee estimate. Unsatisfied with the Town’s response, Mr. Kelleher petitioned this office and this appeal, SPR26/0313, was opened as a result. Fee Estimates – Municipalities A municipality may assess a reasonable fee for the production of a public record except those records that are freely available for public inspection. G. L. c. 66, § 10(d). The fees must reflect the actual cost of complying with a particular request. Id. A maximum fee of five cents ($.05) per page may be assessed for a black and white single or double-sided photocopy of a public record. G. L. c. 66, § 10(d)(i). One Ashburton Place, Room 1719, Boston, Massachusetts 02108 • (617) 727-2832 • Fax: (617) 727-5914 sec.state.ma.us/pre • pre@sec.state.ma.us

Michael P. Seery SPR26/0313 Page 2 February 11, 2026 Municipalities may not assess a fee for the first 2 (two) hours of employee time to search for, compile, segregate, redact or reproduce the record or records requested unless the municipality has 20,000 people or less. G. L. c. 66, § 10(d)(iii). Where appropriate, municipalities may include as part of the fee an hourly rate equal to or less than the hourly rate attributed to the lowest paid employee who has the necessary skill required to search for, compile, segregate, redact or reproduce a record requested, but the fee shall not be more than $25 per hour. Id. However, municipalities may charge more than $25 per hour if such rate is approved by the Supervisor of Records under a petition under G. L. c. 66, § 10(d)(iv). A fee shall not be assessed for time spent segregating or redacting records unless such segregation or redaction is required by law or approved by the Supervisor of Records under a petition under G. L. c. 66, § 10(d)(iv). See G. L. c. 66, § 10(d)(iii); 950 C.M.R. 32.06(4). The Town’s December 29th, January 6th, and January 28th Responses In its first December 29, 2025 response, the Town sought clarification of the request, which Mr. Kelleher subsequently provided. In a second December 29, 2025 response, an IT vendor for the Town detailed its search process as follows: For both security and audit-tracking reasons, ANEVRY generally doesn’t maintain direct login-level access to the email accounts under our management or the passwords of individual users. To access emails directly, we would need to either remotely access specific devices, or temporarily reset passwords. We’d also need to take great pains to ensure we captured and searched everywhere. Resetting the password has its own separate issues, in that it would log out anyone who is using the account and accessing directly would conceal who actually accessed the emails and when… Running a specific, coded query against the full email database in any given moment always returns the exact same results for that moment… It ensures we capture all possible records across all inboxes, folders, and locations throughout the town’s digital archives, including folders which were hidden or moved… With a specific search query coded at the database level, we can guarantee we get exactly the keywords we’re looking for because we ignore these user-specific search algorithms and force the database to return exactly what matches. In addition, the vendor stated, “I will work on getting the number of search results for this request now that I have this updated clarity, so we can best estimate the time for processing and redactions.” In its January 6, 2026 response, the Town provided a fee estimate of $300.00 to produce the responsive records. In support of its fee estimate, the Town provided the following information: After corresponding with [an identified individual], he determined that to comply with your request it would require:

Michael P. Seery SPR26/0313 Page 3 February 11, 2026 Approximately 4 hours to collect the records Time to redact records: 8 hours Total Time =12 hours Fee Estimate: The Town is allowed to charge for employee search time necessary to respond to your request, together with any redactions required by law. That time is charged at the hourly rate of the lowest paid person capable of compiling and reproducing responsive records, in accordance with 950 CMR 32.07(2)(i). Such hourly rate shall not exceed $25/hour unless otherwise authorized by the Supervisor of Records. Please note that because the Town has less than 20,000 residents, pursuant to the last Decennial U.S. Census (approximately 3,439), you will be charged for all hours of work associated with this request. The lowest paid employees capable of performing the necessary search is paid more than $25/hour, so you will be charged the maximum rate. The total fee estimate is $300.00… Until such time as the fees estimated above are paid and the Town has conducted additional work in response to this request, it cannot state conclusively whether records will be withheld or redacted. If records are withheld or redacted, it is anticipated that the following will be the basis(es) for such redactions or withholding. The citing of such exemptions is not meant to be exhaustive, however, and the Town expressly reserves the right to assert application of additional exemptions, as appropriate. Nothing herein shall limit the Town’s ability to redact or withhold information in accordance with state or federal law and/or the attorney-client privilege. In a follow-up email to this office and Mr. Kelleher on January 8, 2026, the Town further explained, “[t]here were 56 email chains comprising 245 individual pages which match the search term. There was only one duplicate chain. This brings the redaction time for 2 minutes per page times 245 pages to 8 hours.” In its January 28, 2026 response, the Town reduced its fee estimate to $200.00 and explained: We arrived at an estimate of two minutes per page based on a good faith calculation. We stand by this however in order to resolve this matter we are willing to reduce it to one minute per page for review and redaction. The purpose of this review and redaction is attorney-client privilege and personal information of a private nature. We anticipate that most of these records contain some degree of this kind of information.

Michael P. Seery SPR26/0313 Page 4 February 11, 2026 Current Appeal In his appeal petition, Mr. Kelleher argued, “[the Town] simply reduced its estimate from two minutes per page to one minute per page and lowered the fee from $300 to $200, while continuing to rely on generalized assertions. A numerical reduction does not cure the legal defects identified in your order.” Fee Waivers G. L. c. 66, § 10(d)(v) provides the following with respect to waiving a fee for the production of responsive records: the records access officer may waive or reduce the amount of any fee charged under this subsection upon a showing that disclosure of a requested record is in the public interest because it is likely to contribute significantly to public understanding of the operations or activities of the government and is not primarily in the commercial interest of the requestor, or upon a showing that the requestor lacks the financial ability to pay the full amount of the reasonable fee. Please be advised, although the Supervisor may encourage fees to be waived, the Supervisor may not mandate that a records access officer waive fees assessed for complying with a public records request; rather, as described above, the records access officer may waive or reduce the amount of any fee upon a showing of various factors. See G. L. c. 66, § 10 (d)(v); see also 950 C.M.R. 32.07(2)(k). Reasonableness of the Fee Estimate Although the Town now indicates that it would take 8 hours to produce and redact the responsive records, it remains unclear why the Town requires this much time. In this case, the Town has sufficiently explained its search process and has clarified it possesses 245 pages of responsive records that will take one minute per page to redact. However, although segregation and redaction under the attorney-client privilege is interpreted to be “required by law,” where the Town also states that it must review and redact “personal information of a private nature,” the Town must clarify whether its fee estimate includes time for segregation or redaction not required by law. Pursuant to the Public Records Law, a fee may not be assessed for time spent segregating or redacting records unless such segregation or redaction is required by law or approved by the Supervisor of Records under a petition under G. L. c. 66, § 10(d)(iv). See G. L. c. 66, § 10(d)(ii); 950 C.M.R. 32.06(4). Accordingly, the Town must provide further details regarding its fee estimate. See G. L. c. 66, § 10(d)(iv) (requiring the amount of the fee be reasonable). For the reasons discussed above, I find the Town must revise its fee estimate or provide further explanation of how the fee estimate of $200.00 is consistent with G. L. c. 66, § 10(d).

Michael P. Seery SPR26/0313 Page 5 February 11, 2026 This office encourages Mr. Kelleher and the Town to communicate to facilitate providing records more efficiently and affordably. Mr. Kelleher may wish to narrow his request. See G. L. c. 66, § 10(b)(vii) (a municipality shall suggest a reasonable modification of the scope of the request or offer to assist the requestor to modify the scope of the request if doing so would enable the municipality to produce the records sought more efficiently and affordably). Any revision to the request would result in the requirement to issue a revised fee estimate. Conclusion Accordingly, the Town is ordered to provide Mr. Kelleher with a response to the request, provided in a manner consistent with this order, the Public Records Law and its Regulations within ten (10) business days. A copy of any such response must be provided to this office. It is preferable to send an electronic copy of the response to this office at pre@sec.state.ma.us. Mr. Kelleher may appeal the substantive nature of the Town’s response within ninety (90) days. See 950 C.M.R. 32.08(1). Sincerely, Manza Arthur Supervisor of Records cc: Christopher Kelleher