Objectives
- Write a request that survives the process objections
- Expect jurisdictional differences and check the statute
Lesson
A records request is defeated far more often by process than by secrecy. The federal statute asks that a request reasonably describe the records sought, which means an office can locate them without conducting research on your behalf, and that it follow the agency's published rules on fees and procedure. In practice, send the request to the right office and commit to paying fees, giving the fee category where the agency asks: journalists, educational requesters, commercial requesters and everyone else are charged differently.
Nine categories of exemption exist, covering:
- classified material
- internal personnel rules
- matters exempted by other statutes
- trade secrets and confidential commercial information
- deliberative and privileged internal memoranda
- personal privacy
- law-enforcement records in six specific circumstances
- financial-institution supervision
- geological data
A refusal cites one. Read which, because the cited exemption tells you what to narrow.
There is a statutory response deadline and an administrative appeal, and after that a court. Most requesters stop at the first refusal, which is why the appeal path exists.
Every other jurisdiction is its own statute. States differ on deadlines, exemptions, fees and dispute procedure, and some interpose an attorney-general opinion before a court. Records withheld under one regime are routinely released under another, so check the statute for the body you are asking, not the one you are used to.