LANSING — Political consultant and former long-time Ingham County Commissioner Mark Grebner is suing Lansing Community College over its denial of a list of names and other information for students at the school.
The two-count lawsuit, filed by Grebner’s attorney, East Lansing Mayor George Brookover, was filed Aug. 8 in the Michigan Court of Claims. Lansing Community College and its Board of Trustees are named as defendants.
Grebner filed a public records request on May 10 for “directory information for all present students,” and said he was seeking the information to “encourage student political involvement, including voter registration and voting, candidate and issue communications, volunteer recruitment, and related research,” according to the complaint.
Specifically, he sought the names, college email addresses and dates of attendance for “all present students, all students admitted to study during 2024, and all students who were enrolled at some point during 2024.”
Marilyn Twine, a spokesperson for LCC, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
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Michigan’s FOIA law requires a response from a public institution within five days, either granting the request, extending the time to gather materials by 10 days, or denying the request. In his lawsuit, Grebner said he didn’t hear from the college within the time limit, and on July 3 he followed up with LCC.
Also on July 3, J.R. Beauboeuf, the director of risk management and legal services at LCC, denied Grebner’s request. He claimed the information requested violated the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, or FERPA, according to the lawsuit.
In the lawsuit, Grebner and Brookover argue the information sought was not exempt from disclosure and the college’s failure to produce the items are a violation of FOIA law.
Grebner, who is an attorney himself, said he’s filed many FOIA lawsuits against public institutions over the years.
In this case, the information he’s seeking is what the college determines to be directory information, which he said would have been printed out in directories in the past. He said he has been able to get this information from other schools across the state, with varying degrees of pushback from the schools.
Grebner is seeking the records and asking a judge to levy a civil fine of $1,000 as well as other damages.
Grebner founded a political consulting firm, Practical Political Data & Forum Strategies, more than 50 years ago. He eventually grew the small voter data firm into a full-service political consulting operation, according to the company’s website.
He served for many years as a Democrat on the Ingham County Board of Commissioners.
Contact Sarah Atwood at [email protected]. Follow her on X @sarahmatwood.
This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: Political consultant Mark Grebner sues Lansing Community College over student data
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