Public Comments Submitted by Kohl Harrington

I do not fully agree with the comment submitted by Cindy Cafaro, Chief of Policy & Operational Support Team, Departmental FOIA Office, Department of the Interior.

She states, "The draft model determination letter proposal seeks to reduce the number of FOIA appeals submitted to the federal government by requiring agencies to provide FOIA requesters with extensive information about the agency's search process at the determination letter stage.  We are concerned both about the premise and the practical impact of this proposal.  At the Department of the Interior (DOI), we do not see a meaningful causal relationship between the number of FOIA appeals we receive each year and the scope of information we routinely provide to requesters about our search processes.  Indeed, most of our appeals (78% in the last fiscal year) are not related to search issues.  Moreover, DOI, like many federal agencies, is working to reduce its FOIA processing backlog.  Requiring FOIA staff to include extensive  information about the search process in our determination letters would add to their workload and likely increase our processing backlog.  This would likely result in additional delays for many FOIA requesters while benefiting, at best, a small subset of potential appellants."

However, this comment does not address what information her FOIA department is including to requestors. My concern as a requestor is not for "appeals." My concern as a requestor is to get as much information as possible. I do not agree that the information in the draft model determination is "extensive." It's actually quite basic. She states that "Indeed, most of our appeals (78% in the last fiscal year) are not related to search issues." She doesn't include what those appeals are for those. Also, she doesn't make clear if 22% is related to search. If so, that's significant. If not, it still doesn't matter because providing basic information as suggested in the draft model determination letter should not be a problem given that FOIA agencies have this information. Her comment doesn't exclude the fact that technology can play a role in streamlining this information to better assist her and her FOIA employees. This comment focused on the "search" process and information about the search but the information in the FOIA "determination" letter goes well beyond the basic "search" aspect.