Director mostly upholds district fee decisions but orders limited reprocessing and FERPA review

Mister Nielsen appealed multiple GRAMA requests covering budgets, property, student safety, and records about his family, arguing the district lumped public‑interest requests into private categories and failed to justify a multi‑thousand‑dollar fee demand. He told the director the district delayed production, invoked extensions and only produced a fee calculation after the appeal was filed.

The district said the requests were voluminous and that the fee estimate reflected time and staffing limits; the district offered to begin searches on a 20% deposit. Director Pearson found parts of the requests (numbers 2, 5, and 6) were not reasonably specific and affirmed the district's fee‑waiver analysis overall, but found the blanket FERPA denial for request 4 improper; he directed the district to reprocess that request in light of recent case law and provided other directions for mediation and future documentation of searches, fees and privilege assertions.