Agencies ordered to report on FOIA improvement efforts
OMB directs agencies to include assessments of progress in upgrading Freedom of Information Act processes in annual e-government reports.
Bush administration officials have ordered agencies to issue regular reports on their progress in improving processes for responding to Freedom of Information Act requests.
Karen Evans, administrator of the Office of E-Government and Information Technology at the Office of Management and Budget, said in an Aug. 25 memorandum to agency chief information officers that a new component of each agency's annual e-government report must detail how its FOIA operations improve public access to government information.
The new requirement is the result of an executive order issued by President Bush late last year requiring agencies to designate chief FOIA officers in addition to principal agency FOIA contact officials, and to develop plans within six months to streamline FOIA processes.
The e-government reports must include a link to agency's FOIA improvement plan and its strategic plan for information resources management.
Previously, OMB had set tight deadlines for appointing chief FOIA officers and encouraged agencies to disseminate information on their Web sites in an effort to reduce the number of FOIA requests.
In the e-government reports, agencies must explain how they categorize data and provide public access to electronic information. Agencies that fund research and development projects must detail how information about them is made available through the RAND Corp.'s Radius database or the Science.gov Web portal.
Under the 2002 E-Government Act, agency e-government reports are published online and incorporated into an OMB report to Congress on the progress of the initiative.
In addition to the information on FOIA implementation, agency reports also must include an overview of their internal e-government efforts, describe how they are "transforming agency operations" and quantify cost savings associated with them, OMB's memo states.
Agencies also must describe the process for determining what information is made available on their Web sites, including a report on progress in creating the capability for searching all public files online.
The reports are due Oct. 20.