FOIA News: POGO Not a Fan of DOJ OIP's Annual FOIA Report

Another Year Another Unhelpful FOIA Report

By Liz Hempowicz, Project on Government Oversight, May 20, 2016

The Office of Information Policy (OIP) recently published its annual Summary and Assessment of the Chief FOIA Officer Reports for 2016. It’s hard to take their findings seriously, however, when they conclude that agencies earned overwhelmingly positive marks despite growing dissatisfaction among requesters who use the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

Two good examples of bad methodology can easily be found in the survey questions OIP used to rate both: 1) how well agencies implement the President’s and the Attorney General Holder’s instructions to proactively disclose documents where possible; and 2) how well agencies are reducing their backlogs of FOIA requests. These examples reflect the larger problem with FOIA implementation: that agencies are less focused on the quality of responses and released records, and more about complying with the law’s requirements on paper.

Frequent FOIA requesters are frustrated with both of these aspects, so the perfunctory questions of whether an agency has a process to identify proactive disclosures or if the backlog has decreased don’t get to the root of the problems.

Read more here.

FOIA News: D.C. Circuit educates Feds on fee category

Court: FOIA discount applies to students, too

By Megan Wilson, The Hill, May 20, 2016

Students filing open records requests with the federal government should be eligible for reduced fees, an appeals court ruled Friday.

Filing a request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) can sometimes result in hundreds or thousands of dollars in charges that are requested by federal officials for duplicating documents and conducting searches.

While some entities — such as the media and teachers at educational institutions — qualify to have these fees reduced, the Defense Department declared that Kathryn Slack, a student, did not.

“If teachers can qualify for reduced fees, so can students,” wrote Judge Brett Kavanaugh in a U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit decision released on Friday. “Students who make FOIA requests to further their coursework or other school-sponsored activities are eligible for reduced fees under FOIA because students, like teachers, are part of an educational institution.”

Read more here.

FOIA News: The Interior Department should honor Congress' intentions on FOIA mediation, opines Sunlight Foundation

The Interior Department should honor Congress' intentions on FOIA mediation

By Alex Howard, Sunlight Foundation, May 19, 2016

According to a letter published by the Office of Government Information Services (OGIS), the U.S. Department of the Interior is effectively ignoring six attempts by the Federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Ombudsman to mediate FOIA requests dating back to February 2015.

In doing so, Interior is honoring neither the spirit nor intent of the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act of 2007, which established OGIS within the National Archives and Records Administration. Sens. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and John Cornyn, R-Texas, created OGIS "so that all Americans can be confident that their FOIA requests would be addressed openly and fairly." The purpose of OGIS is to act as an independent arbiter that starts a process to resolve disputes between federal agencies and FOIA requesters.

Interior ignoring repeated requests for mediation from OGIS goes beyond disregarding the instruction of the president and U.S. attorney general to approach compliance with the Freedom of Information Act with the "presumption of openness."

Read more here.

FOIA News: Ex-Aide to Hillary Clinton Testifies About Email Server

Ex-Aide to Hillary Clinton Testifies About Email Server

By Eric Lichtblau, New York Times, May 18, 2016

A former aide to Hillary Clinton when she was secretary of state testified behind closed doors for two hours Wednesday in the first in a series of depositions that are likely to raise more questions about Mrs. Clinton’s use of a private email server just as she prepares for an election campaign against Donald J. Trump.

The former aide, Lewis A. Lukens, testified under oath about his knowledge of Mrs. Clinton’s private email system as part of a lawsuit brought against the State Department by a conservative legal advocacy group, Judicial Watch.

At least five other officials — including two of Mrs. Clinton’s top aides at the State Department, Cheryl Mills and Huma Abedin — are also scheduled to testify in the lawsuit over the next six weeks in what promises to be an unwelcome distraction for the Clinton campaign.

The last deposition is set for June 29 — less than a month before the start of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, where Mrs. Clinton is widely expected to win her party’s nomination for president over challenger Bernie Sanders.

Read more here.

FOIA News: House proposes to extend FOIA's reach to National Security Council

House Moves to Subject National Security Council to Public Records Law

By Lachlan Markay,  Wash. Free Beacon, May 18, 2016

Congress unanimously advanced a measure on Wednesday to subject the White House’s team of national security advisers to laws giving the public access to internal administration documents.

An amendment to a key Defense Department funding bill brought forward by Rep. Jackie Walorski (R., Ind.) would require the White House National Security Council to produce internal records in response to requests under the Freedom of Information Act.

The amendment comes in the midst of controversy over admissions by Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes in a recent New York Times interview that he and media allies created an “echo chamber” to promote the administration’s nuclear deal with Iran.

Read more here.

FOIA News: Countdown to 50th FOIA Anniversary

50 Days of FOIA: Countdown to the 50th Anniversary of the Freedom of Information Act

By Jesse Franzblau, BORDC/DDF, May 17, 2016

On May 15th, a broad coalition of open government and accountability organizations and media outlets are launching a “50 Days of FOIA” campaign — counting down the days to the 50th anniversary of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) on July 4, 2016. The campaign aims to highlight the importance of the FOIA, while promoting the passage of meaningful reform legislation that now has the potential to become law by the time the statute turns 50 in less than two months.

For nearly 50 years, the FOIA has empowered the public by providing access to information essential for democratic governance and accountability. The law has also been used as a critical tool used to make the public aware of countless acts of waste, fraud, and abuse. With documents obtained under FOIA, countless media outlets, watchdog groups and individuals have broken stories about the  about hazardous drinking water in Flint, Michigan, the IRS’ civil forfeiture program, mistreatment of veterans at the VA medical offices, overdue inspections of the United States’ aging infrastructure, use of immigrant detention centers to hold minors,corporate abuse, and much more.

Read more here

Q&A: Show me the money

Q.   Can I find out the wages of employees working in a local government agency through the freedom of information act?

A.  Government agencies typically release the salaries of most government employees in response to public record requests.  You are not likely to obtain a government employee's pay stub, however, because it contains or reflects information deemed too personal (e.g., insurance elections, tax exemptions, etc.).

FOIA News: Interviews in Civil Suit Over Hillary Clinton Email Server to Begin This Week

Interviews in Civil Suit Over Hillary Clinton Email Server to Begin This Week

By Byron Tau, Wall Street Journal, May 17, 2016

Interviews in a civil lawsuit with current and former State Department officials concerning former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server will begin this week.

Lewis Lukens, a former deputy assistant secretary of state, will be interviewed under oath in the first deposition taken as part of a lawsuit by the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch over access to Mrs. Clinton’s records during her time in office.

The civil lawsuit, which targets the State Department, doesn’t name Mrs. Clinton as a defendant, but it has the potential to complicate her presidential bid. Mrs. Clinton is seeking to clinch the Democratic nomination against rival Bernie Sanders and turn her attention to a likely general-election contest against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump.

The depositions, which will explore why Mrs. Clinton set up a private email server for her government work, will become part of the public record. Judge Emmet Sullivan, a Democratic appointee, granted Judicial Watch the right to conduct discovery, allowing the group to seek information from State Department officials—a rare order in a case concerning the Freedom of Information Act.

Read more here.

Q&A: Paranoia strikes deep . . . into your life it will creep

Q.  How can someone obtain all information that the government has on them?

A.  There is no central repository of federal records from which you can obtain all records about yourself.  Rather, federal records are maintained by individual agencies.  Here is a list of federal agencies and instructions about how to submit requests for records.  

FOIA News: FOIA Covers Confidential Files Sent to NIH, Grants Official Says

FOIA Covers Confidential Files Sent to NIH, Grants Official Says

By Jeannie Baumann, Bloomberg BNA, May 16, 2016

Business plans and other confidential information shouldn't be submitted to the NIH in a conflict-of-interest report because it could be made available to the public, the agency's grants compliance director advised May 12.

Any information provided to the National Institutes of Health is subject to the Freedom of Information Act, which is why Diane Dean of the agency's grants program recommended not submitting any confidential information to the agency. It's also why the NIH's financial conflicts of interest policy says research institutions should submit only key elements of a plan to manage conflicts of interest—such as the role and duties of the investigator and any safeguards to ensure objectivity in the research—but not the plan itself.

“Once we have it, it's subject to FOIA. We can try to protect it but we can't guarantee it,” she said during an NIH regional seminar in Baltimore. “If you've got sensitive information like that, don't send it to us.”

Read more here.