The Polk County clerk has won a legal decision clarifying that she had clear power to determine how copies of public records could be made.

The 3rd District Court of Appeals on Wednesday said Clerk Sharon Schiebel properly refused to allow a political consulting company in July 1999 to make copies of election records on a portable copying machine it brought to her office.

The three-judge panel said Schiebel, as custodian of the records, had the option of determining how poll lists for all elections over four years were copied, and she was correct in demanding that Practical Political Consulting of East Lansing, Mich., pay 25 cents a page to have the lists copied by one of her workers.

State law gives county clerks clear authority to decide whether outside equipment can be used to copy public records, the appeals court said.

Practical Political Consulting argued it had a legal right under state law to make a copy of a public record and use whatever equipment it wanted.

The company's owner, Mark Grebner, said Wednesday he needed to copy 3,000 to 4,000 pages of poll lists in his project to build a computerized file of Wisconsin voters. Many other Wisconsin counties allowed him to use his own copier, he said.

Grebner said he may appeal Wednesday's ruling to the state Supreme Court because it goes against the public interest of broad access to public records.

"I can't imagine we lost. It is just astounding to me. This is a terrible decision," he said in a telephone interview from East Lansing. "It really allows local officials to own documents and basically requires you to pay them to access a document."

Schiebel, who left the job as clerk last April to become Polk County deputy director of administration, said Wednesday she demanded that the Michigan company pay her office to make the desired copies because "we have always just done it that way. Many people ask for poll lists and we have always done it that way."

According to court records, Schiebel, under the advice of the county's attorney, told Practical Political Consulting it could use a digital camera to make pictures of the records or transcribe them into a laptop computer.

Instead, Grebner filed a lawsuit seeking a judge's order allowing him to use his own copying machine.

In upholding Circuit Judge James Taylor's ruling, the appeals court said Grebner was properly permitted access to public records and he was not denied the right to copy them.

"The sole issue is whether the requester can select his or her own equipment to copy the public records without the clerk's permission. The answer is no," the panel said.