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SCHENECTADY
City on the other side as it fights FOI denial Seeks data on National Grid assessment
BY KATHLEEN MOORE Gazette Reporter

    Give and ye shall receive. Or in this case — refuse to give and someday you too might not get what you want.
    The city is finding itself in the same position that many of its residents have been in as it tries to get data from a government body by using the Freedom of Information Law. The state has denied the city’s request, so Corporation Counsel L. John Van Norden is taking the issue to the Court of Appeals, the same court that once allowed the city to deny a FOI request for police discipline records.
    This time, the city is hoping the court will support the FOI request.
    “I’m going to go before the court and say, ‘Here I am on the other side of the issue now,’ ” Van Norden said with a laugh.
    But the issue is hardly a joking matter, he added. The city wants to know more about National Grid’s utilities, in order to determine whether the company is underassessed. Currently National Grid pays taxes on an equalized assessment of $28.4 million, so any increase in that assessment could earn the city thousands of dollars.
    National Grid has turned over the data needed to assess its property, but it only gives that information to the state Office of Real Property Services, which determines it assessment. Then ORPS sends the proposed assessment to each municipality, which have 20 days to challenge it or accept it.
    “We wanted data to know if we wanted to challenge,” Van Norden said. “We wanted to make sure the number ORPS gave us was a fair value.”
    ORPS refused to hand over the data, a decision supported Thursday by the Appellate Division of the state Supreme Court.
    In it, the court said National Grid (once known as Niagara Mohawk) had a right to secrecy because the data could be used by its competitors.
    “There can be little doubt that this data, as described by the record, has significant commercial value not only to the utility, but to potential competitors as well,” the decision read. “Its disclosure would almost assuredly complicate, if not compromise, Niagara Mohawk’s competitive position.”
    Van Norden immediately started work on an appeal to the state Court of Appeals.
    “The appeal says, ‘Excuse me. We’re government,’ ” Van Norden said. “I am a bit surprised by the decision.”
    He argues that the city can’t use the data to compete with National Grid because the city isn’t in the electricity business. Therefore, he said, the competition argument is irrelevant.
    But if the city received the records, other power companies could use the FOI law to request copies of the data. Van Norden said those requests could be denied under the same competition argument that ORPS used to deny the city.
    The city also asked ORPS for data about Verizon and Time Warner utilities. Time Warner did not object to the request and ORPS turned over those records. Verizon also agreed after Van Norden promised to notify the company if any competitor asked for the data.
    But those utilities make up only a small portion of the city’s assessment, with Time Warner assessed at an equalized $570,753 and Verizon at $6.3 million.
    “National Grid is the big one. We think this is important,” Van Norden said. “We’re being told we can’t even see the information that ORPS is using to decide the assessment rate we have to apply. All due respect to the court, that’s crazy. We’re basically being told we can’t have the information we need to decide if ORPS is doing it right.”
    “That doesn’t make sense when you’re dealing with a system that is constantly being rehabbed,” Van Norden said. “We thought it should be valued as a system, not each part. We just wanted to be able to have an informed dialogue on that with ORPS.”

I wonder how the city officials like being treated like mushrooms the same way they have been treating their residents for years.

Mushrooms----I like it.....there is a fungus among us.......

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National Grid has turned over the data needed to assess its property, but it only gives that information to the state Office of Real Property Services, which determines it assessment. Then ORPS sends the proposed assessment to each municipality, which have 20 days to challenge it or accept it.

Aint that freakin' sweet.........that would be part of the monkey's leg I believe.......you know the monkey on NYS taxpayers back.....

'cause then we turn around and pay a bunch of NYS workers to oversee the 'service' we receive from the utility.....what a circle jerk---who's hands are in that mess---ask Mr.Cuomo----he has some time on his hands after cracking the case of the lawyers and the pensions.....