Commonwealth Court adopts federal FOIA exemption allowing data disclosure in DEP decisional documents

摘要

In a Right-to-Know case, Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court ordered on Oct. 27 in camera review to determine whether two documents contain severable "purely factual" materal that should be disclosed although the documents reflect the predecision of the Deparment of Environmental Protection to retain the present classification of Perikomen Creek. "Because this court in Carey adopted our Supreme Court's discussion of predecisional deliberations in Vartan, and Vartan relied upon the United States Supreme Court's decision in Mink, we find the federal case law above interpreting Exemption 5 of the FOIA to be persuasive," the court said.