via Bruce Joffe at the Open Data Consortium the California Appeals court upheld the Santa Clara County Superior Court’s decision to require Santa Clara to provide GIS parcel basemap data under the California Public Records Act, charging no more than the cost of duplication. While 41 other counties provided basemap data for $100 or less, Santa Clara county had atempted to charge over $150,000 for the data. This is a big victory for open government data.
Legal defense was provided by the California First Amendment Coalition whose writeup is here. The full court decision.
But be careful. Open isn’t always so open. Just because you can GET a copy of the data and USE a copy of the data, that doesn’t mean you can SHARE a copy of the data. “Open” means you have to have all of those rights.