FOIA News: 2023 Chief FOIA Officer Reports available

The Attorney General's 2009 FOIA Guidelines require the Chief FOIA Officer (CFO) for each federal agency to submit a report to the Attorney General containing a detailed description of the steps taken by the agency to improve FOIA compliance and transparency. The Department of Justice’s Office of Information Policy has started to post this CFO reports for 2023, which are available on its webpage here.

FOIA News: One FOIA engine gone, another rises

FOIA Mapper is no more. Launched with great fanfare in 2016, the search engined developed by Max Galka allowed users to search a database of past FOIA requests, as well as a catalog of the government’s systems of records. Mr. Galka did not respond to FOIA Advisor’s request for comment before this post was published.

Perhaps filling part of that void is FOIAengine, a commercial tool in beta testing that allows subscribed users to search agency FOIA logs. When FOIA Advisor was provided access during the first week in March, the engine included logs from about 15 agencies and was word searchable by, among other things, subject, agency, requester name, and requester organization. We found FOIAengine to be user-friendly with a clean interface. What remains unclear from the website is how many more agencies are likely be included (all cabinet agencies, for example?), and whether FOIA logs will be added more regularly than, say, once per year.

FOIA News: OIP Announces Additional Training Dates

OIP Announces Additional FOIA Training Dates

Office of Info. Pol’y, Dep’t of Justice, Mar. 15, 2023

Today, the Office of Information Policy (OIP) announces new dates for FOIA training for the remainder of Fiscal Year 2023.  As part of its responsibility to encourage agency compliance with the FOIA, OIP offers numerous training opportunities throughout the year for agency FOIA professionals and individuals with FOIA responsibilities. 

These courses are designed to offer training opportunities for personnel from all stages of the FOIA workforce, from new hires to the experienced FOIA professionals or FOIA managers.  OIP will continue to offer virtual training sessions that will be taught in real-time by OIP instructors.  We are pleased to announce these virtual training courses, which are also available on OIP’s Eventbrite page.

The courses and dates scheduled for the remainder of Fiscal Year 2023 are:

Introduction to the Freedom of Information Act
April 4, 2023

Processing a Request from Start to Finish
April 12, 2023

Procedural Requirements and Fees Training
May 3, 2023

Litigation Workshop
May 10, 2023

Administrative Appeals, FOIA Compliance, and Customer Service
May 17, 2023

Exemption 1 and Exemption 7 Training
June 6, 2023

Exemption 4 and Exemption 5 Training
June 21, 2023

Privacy Considerations Training
July 11, 2023

Continuing FOIA Education
July 12, 2023

Read more here.

Court opinions issued Mar. 13, 2023

Vidal-Martinez v. ICE (N.D. Ill.) -- denying plaintiff’s interim petition for award of attorneys fees and costs because agency, not plaintiff, was prevailing party in underlying litigation; rejecting plaintiff’s contention that court’s scheduling orders and minute entries altered parties’ legal relationship or granted plaintiff relief on merits; further rejecting plaintiff’s argument that agency changed its legal position under “catalyst theory” of eligibility.

Summaries of all published opinions issued since April 2015 are available here.

Commentary: FOIA metrics—FY 2022

On March 2, 2023, the Department of Justice published data reported by agencies in their annual Freedom of Information Act reports for fiscal year 2022. The data, available on the website FOIA.gov, indicates among other things that agencies received a record-breaking 928,353 requests and that the government’s overall request backlog increased nearly 35 percent. FOIA Advisor staffers Allan Blutstein (AB), Kevin Schmidt (KS), and Ryan Mulvey (RM) share their thoughts on the government’s FOIA metrics.

AB: As goes the Department of Homeland Security, so goes the government, FOIA-wise. And FY 2022 was not kind to DHS. Requesters deluged DHS with nearly 100k more requests than in FY 2021, and the department’s request backlog more than doubled from 25k to 52k. Other agencies also encountered difficulties, albeit on a smaller scale. For example, two popular targets for requesters, DOJ and State, saw their request backlogs rise by 32 percent and 25 percent, respectively. Of note, DOJ now has more backlogged requests at 64,982 than any other agency. A less FOIA-active cabinet agency, the Department of Education, suffered a 123 percent increase in its request backlog.

Processing times are always important to requesters, and in FY 2022 the Office of Science and Technology Policy stood out by taking an average of 409 days to process “simple” perfected requests. Even greater patience is required of requesters who submit “complex” requests to NARA, which reported taking 1048 days on average to process them.

KS: DHS drives the big topline numbers, but FOIA requests received surged in FY22 compared to FY21 among most cabinet agencies. Only Agriculture (19%), Commerce (23%), DOJ (5%) and VA (19%) saw reductions. Big increases at Energy (14%), HHS (14%), State (23%) and Transportation (18%) and smaller increases among the rest.

RM: What struck me was that, across the whole government, the total number of full-time FOIA employees dropped by roughly 300. If we focus on some of the bigger, cabinet-level agencies that have been mentioned so far, the agency-level fluctuation in staffing varies quite a bit. Labor saw no change in staffing. A few agencies increased staffing: DOD (+73), DHS (+41), HHS (+21), Interior (+12), HUD (+8), Treasury (+2), and Energy (+1). Other agencies cut their staffs: State (-45), Education (-31), Commerce (-24), DOJ (-13), Transportation (-9), and USDA (-4). The VA, oddly enough, stands out in a category of its own. Based on its annual reports, the VA’s number of full-time FOIA employees dropped by 299. At first that looked like it must be an error, but I double-checked the reports. It looks like all those employees had been found in the VHA.

AB: I’m glad you looked into staffing levels, Ryan, as that significantly influences the government’s ability to fulfill requests/appeals and processing time. It likely also affects an agency’s ability to collect processing fees from requesters. The available data indicates that agencies collected a meager $2.19 million in FY 2022, an infinitesimal fraction of the $543.7 million that agencies expended to process requests. Taxpayers should not be pleased by this flow of federal largesse, especially when only a minority of requests advance public interests.

FOIA News; AFP Foundation Launches 2023 Sunshine Week Symposium and Webinar

How government transparency and the Freedom of Information Act have transformed society

Americans for Prosperity Foundation, Mar. 13, 2023

On each day of Sunshine Week, AFPF will publish one or two thought-provoking essays. Check back on this page to find the links to all the contributions! On Thursday, March 16, our essayists will come together in a virtual webinar to respond to each other and to answer your questions.   

Register here for the March 16 webinar.

…

This year’s essayists represent a selection of respected leaders with years of experience working toward government accountability and transparency. They each bring differing views and ideas to the table. That sort of intellectual diversity is an important part of finding ideal solutions and building an open society where the marketplace of ideas is respected.   

Our participants include: 

• Ryan Mulvey & James Valvo, Americans for Prosperity Foundation — “The Freedom of Information Act: A testament to the value of transparency” Read full article. 

• Anne Weismann — “Has the Freedom of Information Act lived up to its purpose?” Read full article. 

• Daniel Schuman, Demand Progress 

• Jason R. Baron, University of Maryland 

• David Cuillier, Brechner Freedom of Information Project, University of Florida — “Strengthening FOIA: Time for teeth” Read full article.

• Bernard Bell, Rutgers Law School 

• Lauren Harper, National Security Archive — “How declassification mechanisms and FOIA have ensured vital transparency in the history of American foreign policy” Read full article.  

Read exclusive essays from previous symposia below:

• 2021 – “Restoring accountability: How government transparency empowers Americans to drive change” 

• 2022 – “Reforming FOIA: The best ideas for better government transparency and accountability” 

Read more here.

Register for the webinar here.

FOIA News: Q&A with the OGIS Director

We Make Access Happen: FOIA Q&A with OGIS Director Alina M. Semo

By Victoria Macchi, Nat’l Archives News, Mar. 14, 2023

Sunshine Week (March 12-18) marks the moment every year when researchers, journalists, non-profit groups, and the people who make access to federal records happen spread the word about the importance of open access to public information.

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which provides a right of access to federal records, is an important tool for viewing government information.

When Congress amended the FOIA in 2007, it created the Office of Government Information Services (OGIS), which is part of the National Archives.

This part of the agency is tasked with reviewing FOIA policies, procedures, and compliance across federal agencies, and also with resolving FOIA disputes between federal agencies and requesters.

OGIS Director Alina M. Semo shares with National Archives News why Sunshine Week is important at the National Archives, what FOIA is, and how the National Archives makes access happen in light of so many requests for information.

Read more here.

FOIA News: Vanita Gupta's remarks at DOJ "Sunshine Week" event

Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta Delivers Remarks at the Justice Department's Sunshine Week Celebration

By DOJ, Justice News, Mar. 13, 2023

Thank you, Bobby, for that introduction. And more importantly, thank you for your leadership of the Office of Information Policy (OIP) and the guidance that you provide to the Justice Department and agencies across the federal government to increase compliance with the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and to strengthen government transparency. 

So, good morning! Thank you all for joining us for the Department of Justice. It’s our kick-off for Sunshine Week. And this annual event is now in its 13th year. And it’s all the more special today because this is our first time coming together in person since the pandemic to celebrate the importance of the FOIA and the critical role that federal employees, particularly agency FOIA professionals, play in ensuring a transparent, accountable and effective government. 

Read more here.

FOIA News: More on DOJ’s new guidance; FOIA websites

The Justice Department Underscores the Need for FOIA ‘Presumption of Openness’

New guidance comes at the start of the annual “Sunshine Week” promoting open government.

By Courtney Buble, Gov’t Exec., Mar. 13, 2023

The Justice Department issued new Freedom of Information Act guidelines on Monday, underscoring the need to have a “presumption of openness.” 

The release came at the beginning of the annual Sunshine Week, which promotes open government, and follows related guidance Attorney General Merrick Garland issued last March. Federal agencies reached a record high of 928,353 information requests in fiscal 2022, and processed a record high of 878,420, according to recently released statistics from the Justice Department. Yet despite the high number of requests processed, the backlog of pending requests increased by 34%. Delays in receiving records requests and redactions in requests received have long frustrated journalists, transparency advocates, lawmakers and others who make use of FOIA.

Read more here.

FOIA News: Worst FOIA responses of 2022

The Electronic Frontier Foundation and MuckRock have issued their annual list of 14 public records responses—at both the federal and local level—as “the worst in government transparency.”