Office of Information Practices

Opinion Letter No. 90-21
June 20, 1990
Financial and Compliance Audit of Advocacy Agency

[Please note that opinions discussing the deliberative process privilege have been materially affected by the Hawaii Supreme Court’s majority opinion in Peer News LLC v. City and County of Honolulu, 143 Haw. 472 (Dec. 21, 2018).]

Portions of a financial and compliance audit report on the Protection and Advocacy Agency of Hawaii must be made available for public inspection and copying under the UIPA. Portions of the report that contain opinions, recommendations, and evaluations on policy matters may be withheld by the agency since this information is protected from disclosure by the “deliberative process privilege.” Disclosure of information about individuals mentioned in the report would not constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy, because the agency being audited performed public purposes using sizable public subsidies. The public interest in disclosure of this information outweighs the privacy interests of the individuals mentioned in the report.

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