39 Misc. 2d 338 | N.Y. Sup. Ct. | 1963
Petitioners make application for an order, pursuant to article- 78 of the Civil Practice Act, directing respondents to produce for inspection, the desk audit proceedings and analysis of petitioners’ jobs with the City of New York.
Each of the petitioners are employees in the legal service of the New York City Rent and Rehabilitation Administration. When the City of New York took over the regulation of residential rents within the city, it also- acquired those employees who had been serving as State employees of the State Rent Commission. Upon such acquisition, it became necessary to classify these employees into titles and positions compatible to the New York City Career and Salary Plan.
Admittedly, position classification is conducted and accomplished in the following manner: Each employee completes a position classification questionnaire which details the nature and type of work performed and contains the employee’s duties and responsibilities. This completed questionnaire is then reviewed by his supervisor or other superior who may or may not add any comments with respect thereto. Thereafter the classifying authority sends a field representative to personally interview the employee and to complete a desk audit report, which is a more precise questionnaire encompassing the entire
Petitioners are dissatisfied with the titles ascribed to them and are appealing to the Career and Salary Classification Appeals Board. Petitioners contend that in order to properly prepare their appeals it is necessary to inspect and examine the complete return of the desk audit proceedings to which the respondents have refused them access. Respondents argue that petitioners are entitled to inspection of all of the public records concerning the job classification but not any notes, memoranda and computations made in the course of the desk audit proceedings. Respondents urge that what petitioners are seeking are not records required or necessary to be kept by the authorities under any statute, rule, regulation or other authority. Moreover, respondents assert that these notes are not used by anyone to review the findings but are made and used only by the classifiers for their use and their own convenience and are often destroyed shortly after they serve their purpose. Again, the two last sentences are somewhat inconsistent and not explained by respondents. They seem to urge upon this court that notes, memoranda and comments are made but are absolutely meaningless, of no importance and are in no way used in arriving at a classification of an individual employee. If this is the fact, the query arises as to why such notes are needed at all. Since they are made, and form part of the file and inquiry, it seems reasonable to this court that the comments and notes, etc. may very well have been used in some cases as a guide or supplement in arriving at a job classification. The question presented herein is whether it constitutes part of the public record which the parties agree is legally available to petitioners. Both petitioners and respondents rely on the same authority to support their