Court responds to request for judges’ email addresses

The Wisconsin Supreme Court is denying a request for the court to release the direct email addresses of Wisconsin judges.

The request was made by talk show host Mark Belling and was the subject of a column posted to WBA Newsroom on Monday.

In a letter to Belling released Monday, the court said it applied the balancing test to determine if judges’ direct email addresses were subject to open meetings law.

“Currently, those for whom you seek email addresses are available to the public by means of other communication methods that can be screened in a way that emails cannot, thereby assuring that they do not involve ex parte communications,” the letter stated.

The letter said the Wisconsin Supreme Court has not ruled whether the court is subject to public records law and that it considers the issue undecided.