OGIS Recommendations for Improving FOIA and Dispute Resolution Programs

OGIS RECOMMENDATIONS FOR IMPROVING FOIA FOIA also directs OGIS to make recommendations to Congress and the President to improve FOIA. In April 2012, OGIS released five recommendations that the Office compiled in its first years. For example, OGIS encouraged agency participation in FOIAonline, the Federal Government’s first multiagency FOIA portal. As a founding partner in FOIAonline, OGIS continues to support the portal’s improvement of services and expansion of partners. In March 2013, OGIS issued four additional recommendations for improving FOIA. 1. IMPLEMENTING DISPUTE RESOLUTION FOR FOIA CONFLICTS OGIS expanded its dispute resolution program to connect FOIA professionals, legal counsel, and dispute resolution professionals to embed dispute resolution firmly into an agency’s FOIA process. The goal is to identify issues that are ripe for partnership and explore ways to work together to prevent and resolve disputes as well as avoid litigation. In 2013, OGIS identified several agencies, including OGIS’s parent agency, NARA, to help to pilot a project designed to prevent and resolve disputes as well as avoid litigation. OGIS has begun meeting with each of these agencies to determine the types of FOIA disputes that result in litigation and to explore ways to incorporate dispute resolution into their FOIA processes. (OGIS also has worked with the Administrative Conference of the United States to promote research into FOIA litigation to inform this process.) OGIS will continue to pilot this project in FY 2014. > HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_025868