House Oversight Full Committee FOIA Hearings Wrap-Up - United States House Committee on Oversight and Accountability

Takeaways:

Agencies do not realize how broken the FOIA system really is.
Agencies are under orders from the White House to delay document requests for political review.
Agencies have a culture of withholding and not prioritizing FOIA.
The IRS used a “special project team” to evaluate Lois Lerner’s emails.
Requesters face numerous barriers with delays and redactions being the most significant.

Purpose of Hearings:

To examine the use of FOIA requests as a tool for government transparency and explore barriers to accessing public documents from the user’s perspective.
To examine the processes agencies use to meet FOIA’s legal requirements and explore barriers to effective and efficient compliance from the FOIA officer’s perspective.
To hear from witnesses that use FOIA in news reporting, academic research, and to conduct government oversight.
To hear from the witnesses tasked with implementing FOIA at several agencies that need to improve response efforts.

Background:

Enacted in 1966, FOIA is a transparency tool for individuals to ensure government accountability. Under FOIA, requesters may ask federal agencies for information about any matter. An agency has 20 business days to respond to a request (and an additional ten days for unusual circumstances) and must release non-exempt records to the requester.
In Fiscal Year 2014, the federal government received 714,231 FOIA requests. The backlog of FOIA cases that had not been processed within the statutory time limit increased by 67 percent to a total of 159,741 backlogged cases.

Witnesses:

Ms. Sharyl Attkisson, Investigative Reporter
Mr. Jason Leopold, Investigative Reporter , Vice News
Mr. David E. McCraw, VP and Assistant General Counsel, New York Times
Ms. Leah Goodman, Investigative Reporter, Newsweek
Mr. Terry Anderson, Honorary Chairman, Committee to Protect Journalists
Mr. Tom Fitton, President, Judicial Watch
Ms. Cleta Mitchell, Partner, Foley & Lardner LLP
Mr. Nate Jones, Director of the Freedom of Information Act Project, National Security Archive
Ms. Lisette Garcia, FOIA Resource Center
Mr. Gabriel Rottman, Legislative Counsel/Policy Advisor, American Civil Liberties Union
Ms. Anne Weismann, Executive Director, Campaign for Accountability
Ms. Karen Neuman, Chief Privacy Officer/Chief FOIA Officer, Department of Homeland Security
Ms. Joyce A. Barr, Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Administration/Chief FOIA Officer, U.S. Department of State
Ms. Melanie Ann Pustay, Director, Office of Information Policy, Department of Justice
Ms. Mary Howard, Director Privacy, Governmental Liaison and Disclosure, IRS
Mr. Brodi Fontenot, Assistant Secretary for Management/Chief FOIA Officer, Department of Treasury