The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Advisory Committee shared information and heard ideas from previous Committee terms to organize itself into three subcommittees for the 2022-2024 term.
Each subcommittee is led by two co-chairs, one of whom is a federal employee, the other a representative from the requester community. The subcommittees will do much of the work of the Committee, which consists of 20 FOIA experts — 10 government FOIA professionals and 10 requester community representatives appointed by Acting Archivist of the United States Debra Steidel Wall.
The Implementation Subcommittee will examine past recommendations, what phase of
implementation they are in and whether additional recommendations should be made. David Cuillier of the University of Arizona and Catrina Pavlik-Keenan of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security are the co-chairs.
The Modernization Subcommittee will examine a plethora of technology-related topics including machine learning, case management tools, records management and proactive disclosures.. Jason R. Baron of the University of Maryland and Gorka Garcia-Malene of the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, are the co-chairs.
The Resources Subcommittee will examine FOIA funding/fees, training for FOIA officers, and look at other obstacles that affected resources for FOIA. Paul Chalmers of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation and Ginger Quintero-McCall of Demand Progress are the co-chairs.
The FOIA Advisory Committee, established in 2014, studies the federal FOIA landscape and advises on improvements to FOIA administration by all 15 Cabinet-level departments and 104 independent agencies. The 2020-2022 term of the Committee made 21 recommendations for improving the FOIA process. Mark your calendars: the next FOIA Advisory Committee meeting is scheduled for December 1, 2022.
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