Freedom Of Information Act Requests
To Make a FOIA Request to Essex County:
Essex County and its Constitutional Officers have divided the responsibilities of responding to FOIA requests. Each Constitutional Officer, or their designee, will be acting as their own Information Officer. FOIA requests should be directed to the appropriate officer. Contact information for the officers may be found below. If you have a question concerning whom to direct your request to, you may contact Juanita Sydnor for assistance.
The following resources are provided to assist you in making your request to Essex County:
Sample FOIA Request Letter
Fill-able MS Word Document FOIA Request Letter
Petition for Injunction of Mandamus
Petition Instructions
Rights
& Responsibilities:
The
Rights of Requesters and the Responsibilities of Essex County
under
the Virginia
Freedom of Information Act
The Virginia Freedom of Information Act
(FOIA), located § 2.2-3700 et seq. of the Code of Virginia, guarantees citizens
of the Commonwealth and representatives of the media access to public records
held by public bodies, public officials, and public employees.
A public record is any writing or recording
-- regardless of whether it is a paper record, an electronic file, an audio or
video recording, or any other format -- that is prepared or owned by, or in the
possession of a public body or its officers, employees or agents in the
transaction of public business. All
public records are presumed to be open, and may only be withheld if a specific,
statutory exemption applies.
The policy of
FOIA states that the purpose of FOIA is to promote an increased awareness by
all persons of governmental activities.
In furthering this policy, FOIA requires that the law be interpreted
liberally, in favor of access, and that any exemption allowing public records
to be withheld must be interpreted narrowly.
Your FOIA Rights
- You have the right to request
to inspect or receive copies of public records, or both.
- You have the right to request
that any charges for the requested records be estimated in advance.
- If you believe that your FOIA
rights have been violated, you may file a petition in district or circuit
court to compel compliance with FOIA.
Alternatively, you may contact the FOIA Council for a nonbinding
advisory opinion.
Making a Request for records from Essex
County
- You may request records by U.S.
Mail, fax, e-mail, in person, or over the phone. FOIA does not require that your request
be in writing, nor do you need to specifically state that you are
requesting records under FOIA.
- From a practical perspective,
it may be helpful to both you and the person receiving your request to
put your request in writing. This
allows you to create a record of your request. It also gives us a clear statement of
what records you are requesting, so that there is no misunderstanding
over a verbal request. However, we
cannot refuse to respond to your FOIA request if you elect to not put it
in writing.
- Your request must identify the
records you are seeking with "reasonable specificity." This is a common-sense standard. It does not refer to or limit the volume
or number of records that you are requesting; instead, it requires that
you be specific enough so that we can identify and locate the records that
you are seeking.
- Your request must ask for
existing records or documents. FOIA
gives you a right to inspect or copy records; it does not apply to
a situation where you are asking general questions about the work of Essex
County, nor does it require Essex County to create a record that does not
exist.
- You may choose to receive
electronic records in any format used by Essex County in the regular
course of business.
- For example, if you are
requesting records maintained in an Excel database, you may elect to
receive those records electronically, via e-mail or on a computer disk,
or to receive a printed copy of those records
- If we have questions about your
request, please cooperate with staff's efforts to clarify the type of
records that you are seeking, or to attempt to reach a reasonable
agreement about a response to a large request. Making a FOIA request is not an
adversarial process, but we may need to discuss your request with you to
ensure that we understand what records you are seeking.
To
request records from Essex County, you may direct your request to Michael Lombardo. He can be reached at 202 South
Church Lane, Tappahannock, VA 22560;
804-443-4331; mlombardo@essex-virginia.org;
fax: 804-445-8023. You may also contact her with questions you
have concerning requesting records from Essex County. In addition, the Freedom of Information
Advisory Council is available to answer any questions you may have about
FOIA. The Council may be contacted by
e-mail at foiacouncil@dls.virginia.gov, or by phone at (804) 225-3056 or [toll
free] 1-866-448-4100.
Essex County’s Responsibilities in
Responding to Your Request
- Essex County must respond to
your request within five working days of receiving it. "Day One" is considered the
day after your request is received.
The five-day period does not include weekends or holidays.
- The reason behind your request
for public records from Essex County is irrelevant, and you do not have to
state why you want the records before we respond to your request. FOIA does, however, allow Essex County
to require you to provide your name and legal address.
- FOIA requires that Essex County
make one of the following responses to your request within the five-day
time period:
1) We provide you with the records that
you have requested in their entirety.
2) We withhold all of the records that
you have requested, because all of the records are subject to a specific
statutory exemption. If all of the
records are being withheld, we must send you a response in writing. That writing must identify the volume and
subject matter of the records being withheld, and state the specific section of
the Code of Virginia that allows us to withhold the records.
3) We provide some of the records that
you have requested, but withhold other records.
We cannot withhold an entire record if only a portion of it is subject
to an exemption. In that instance, we
may redact the portion of the record that may be withheld, and must provide you
with the remainder of the record. We
must provide you with a written response stating the specific section of the
Code of Virginia that allows portions of the requested records to be withheld.
4) We inform you in writing that the
requested records cannot be found or do not exist (we do not have the records
you want). However, if we know that
another public body has the requested records, we must include contact
information for the other public body in our response to you.
5) If it is practically impossible for Essex
County to respond to your request within the five-day period, we must state
this in writing, explaining the conditions that make the response
impossible. This will allow us seven
additional working days to respond to your request, giving us a total of 12
working days to respond to your request.
- If you make a request for a
very large number of records, and we feel that we cannot provide the
records to you within 12 working days without disrupting our other
organizational responsibilities, we may petition the court for additional
time to respond to your request.
However, FOIA requires that we make a reasonable effort to reach an
agreement with you concerning the production or the records before we go
to court to ask for more time.
Costs
- A
public body may make reasonable charges not to exceed its actual cost
incurred in accessing, duplicating, supplying, or searching for the
requested records. No public body shall impose any extraneous, intermediary,
or surplus fees or expenses to recoup the general costs associated with
creating or maintaining records or transacting the general business of the
public body. Any duplicating fee charged by a public body shall not exceed
the actual cost of duplication. All charges for the supplying of requested
records shall be estimated in advance at the request of the citizen as set
forth in subsection F of § 2.2-3704 of the Code of Virginia.
- You may have to pay for the
records that you request from Essex County. FOIA allows us to charge for the actual
costs of responding to FOIA requests.
This would include items like staff time spent searching for the
requested records, copying costs, or any other costs directly related to
supplying the requested records. It
cannot include general overhead costs.
- Persons making FOIA requests requiring more than 15 minutes
of staff time for a response shall be charged $19.00 per hour for search
time, charged in fifteen minute increments. A copying charge of
$0.02 per page (first 5 copies are complimentary) will also be assessed
for copies.
- If we estimate that it will
cost more than $200 to respond to your request, we may require you to pay
a deposit, not to exceed the amount of the estimate, before proceeding
with your request. The five days
that we have to respond to your request does not include the time between
when we ask for a deposit and when you respond.
- You may request that we
estimate in advance the charges for supplying the records that you have
requested. This will allow you to
know about any costs upfront, or give you the opportunity to modify your
request in an attempt to lower the estimated costs.
- If you owe us money from a
previous FOIA request that has remained unpaid for more than 30 days, Essex
County may require payment of the past-due bill before it will respond to
your new FOIA request.
Types of records
The
following is a general description of the types of records held by Essex County:
·
Personnel
records concerning employees and officials of Essex County
·
Records
of contracts which Essex County has entered into
·
General
administrative records
·
Land
use records
If you are
unsure whether Essex County has the record(s) you seek, please contact Michael Lombardo directly at 202 South Church
Lane, Tappahannock, VA 22560;
804-443-4311; mlombardo@essex-virginia.org; fax:
804-445-8023.
Commonly used exemptions
The Code of
Virginia allows any public body to withhold certain records from public
disclosure. Essex County commonly
withholds records subject to the following exemptions:
·
Personnel
records (§ 2.2-3705.1 (1) of the Code of Virginia)
·
Records
subject to attorney-client privilege (§ 2.2-3705.1 (2)) or attorney work
product (§ 2.2-3705.1 (3))
·
Vendor
proprietary information (§ 2.2-3705.1 (6))
·
Records
relating to the negotiation and award of a contract, prior to a contract being
awarded (§ 2.2-3705.1 (12))
Policy regarding the use of exemptions
- The general policy of Essex County is to invoke
the personnel records exemption in those instances where it applies in
order to protect the privacy of employees and officials of Essex County.
- The general policy of Essex County is to invoke
the contract negotiations exemption whenever it applies in order to
protect Essex County’s bargaining position and negotiating strategy.
- The general policy of the County of Essex is to invoke the
attorney-client privilege exemption whenever it applies in order to
protect the County’s interest in any suit or contract negotiation.
Freedom Of Information and Open Government Resources
VA Coalition for Open Government
http://www.opengovva.org/
2013 -2014 Freedom Of information Act
http://www.opengovva.org/current-law
Freedom Of Information Citizen’s Guide
http://www.opengovva.org/virginias-foia-resources
National Freedom of Information Coalition – Virginia Resources
http://www.nfoic.org/virginia-foi-resources
Federal Freedom Of Information Site
http://www.foia.gov/