Public access to County deed Records halted
Groveton News - February 9, 2007 - February 16, 2007
By GREG PEAK
Area news editor

GROVETON – A Texas Attorney General’s opinion issued last week has effectively slammed the door on public access to county deed records throughout the state – a move that could cost Trinity County money.
In the opinion, Attorney General Greg Abbott said because the deed records contain confidential information, in particular the Social Security numbers of living people, the public can no longer have direct access to them.
Abbot said while the records in question are classified as public records under the state’s Public Information Act, the confidentiality of Social Security numbers overrides the provisions of that law.
Trinity County Clerk Diane McCrory said her office began complying with Abbot’s opinion on Monday and the move is placing a strain on the resources of her office.
“This is causing problems across the state,” she said. “In Nacogdoches County, they had to call the police to come to the clerk’s office because the oil and gas researchers almost rioted when they were told they could no longer access the records themselves.”
She added the county clerk in Angelina County had to close down her records’ vault completely.
Because the opinion was just issued, McCrory said county clerks throughout the state are still trying to sort our how to handle it.
“We’ve all been advised to defer to our county attorney for a recommendation on how to comply and if we should comply with the AG opinion,” she said.

She noted that Trinity County Attorney Joe Bell has advised her to follow the opinion’s guidelines.
 “The legislature is in session right now and hopefully they can do something to help us sort through all of this,” McCrory added.
Because of the boom in oil and gas exploration in East Texas, the last few months have seen a large number of oil and gas landmen coming to the clerk office to research the mineral ownership for tracts of land throughout the county.
During January, income collected by McCrory’s office hit a new record high at $28,849 and the clerk estimated that about $20,000 of that came from copy fees collected from the landmen.
Until Monday, anyone wanting to perform research using the deed records was allowed to go through the records on their own, locate the items they wanted copied and then pay a deputy clerk to make the copies.
She noted that in the past, up to eight landmen have been performing research at the same time.
Under the new procedures, members of the public have to ask McCrory or one of her deputies to get the record for them.
“We have to look at the record to see if there is any confidential information. Then when we make a copy, we have to redact the confidential information before we give it to the customer,” she said.
“This not only affects the oil and gas researcher but it will hurt title companies, surveyors and even genealogists,” McCrory added.
Under the AG’s opinion, county clerks may still label copies as “certified” but the certification must reflect that Social Security numbers have been redacted.
McCrory noted the clerk’s deed record indexes are still open for public inspection to allow people to determine what records they want to have copied, but the actual location and copying of the records must now be handled by her staff.
“Yesterday was the first day we followed this process and my staff and I needed roller skates. We were kept flying trying to meet the request for copies,” she said.
She noted that prior to the ruling, her staff included two full-time deputy clerks and one part-timer.
“As of yesterday, my part-time clerk became full-time and I am starting to look for a fourth person,” she said.
She noted she will be asking Trinity County commissioners at their March 12 meeting for permission to amend her budget to include the additional help.
“While this is all going on, we still have our other duties that must continue,” McCrory added. “People are still walking in the office wanting to file documents; marriage, birth and death certificates still have to be processed; wills still need to be probated; and clerks still need to work with the county court and the commissioners’ court.”
While the new procedures will slow down the process, McCrory was unsure how it would finally impact the income generated by her office.
Because of the need for additional help, the expenses will go up but until they gain experience with handling requests for deed record copies, she could not guess what impact it will have on income.