Concerns of people new to FOIA

1. Reluctance to even seek records in the first place. I think this stems from several different things.

a) Fear of retribution from government officials. This is a very real fear that must be overcome. In Wisconsin, it is not necessary to give a name but the reality is you have to give at least a phone number, which can be traced. Most people are not sophisticated enough to have a P.O. Box or other privacy measures in place to reassure the requestor that they will not face any retaliation from their government.

2. Most people don't know where or who to ask for the records. This can be a major hurdle for many novice requestors, especially when dealing with large bureaucracies at the state or federal level, sometimes even large, local bureaucrats can be very imposing.

3. Most people have no idea what records are available. There are a multitude of different agencies that may have government records. An example would be, where do you go to get the records for traffic signals and how often a traffic light may turn from green to red. Yes, this actually is a public record and this is an issue that I dealt with recently but it took me a lot to find the agency that has those records. Another good example, is non-profit agencies. At least in Wisconsin, if a non-profit gets most of their revenue from tax dollars, they are subject to Open Records laws, for the most part. This would include their financial information and where and how they are spending the money that they get from the tax payers. School Districts are another good example. They have numerous segregated funds that can be overwhelming for anyone other than an accountant or CPA. I will work on a list of agencies and bureaucracies when I have some spare time but I think you can see the difficulty with this. The most difficult thing that I do when working with small groups is to get them to think along the lines of what records are available that deal with the issue that has them angry and then where do we go to get those records.

4. The last thing that I see that makes it difficult for the novice is they don't follow through on their request. It is vital that when asking for records for the requestor to give a date specific when they expect the records to be available. If the agency does not provide the records in a timely fashion, they must be willing to follow thru with additional action. This might mean sending a follow-up letter or request. This would include a letter to the government agency that oversees that dept. or they must be willing to follow thru with a court action if that appears to be the last course of action that they have left. The bottom line is, they have to be willing to ask, ask again and again and again until they get the records that they want.