damage and they also released a raw form of that without the comments and longer. now, reuters and i'm not an expert on this but according to i read in the press, they've been loog being for that information for a couple of years through foia was the pentagon and getting absolutely nowhere. they were quite interested to see what was in this video when it was released. i think the perception of the public was they had a right to see the video and understand what happened in that incident, at least as star as you could from the video. but i think in terms of trying to get away from all this, i don't think if what you described again, i think the public has seen information which they think should be

released but wouldn't be released under the current regimen. i realize it's an impossible question because of the issues of national security. but could you just tell me how congress responds to that, what i think is a wildly held public perception. >> anyone. >> i think -- i mean, it's difficult to address outside of the particular facts of any one particular incident. i think that there's certainly -- i mean, it's an important balance to ensure that we're protecting generally national security and properly classified information and that that's not compromised and then on the other hand ensuring that information isn't being improperly withheld. i mean, that's no news to anyone, but i think that's just the balances that has to be given. in terms of responding to the public perception, it's just i think listening to the public and making sure -- there are

particular incidents, i'm not addressing those facts but there have been cases in the past where because congress has heard from the public that there were concerns about a particular something being withhead, that was actually addressed by congress. it's a different snare yof but could you look at the wall street reform bill and what was done there. that obviously wasn't referring to classified information, but because thereof a public outcried, my boss and senator leahy worked together and passed a roll back of that exemption. so i think congress has to listen to the public and hear. but there's just sort of that weighing and just because something has been improperly released doesn't necessarily mean that it should be properly released. on the other hand, we have the situation where there's a current issue with the camp lejeune water contamination information and information that had been previously released the

department of defense is now saying shouldn't be released and that's very troubling because if it's information that has been released by the government in the past, it certainly raises the question why that information can't continue to be released. >> any other comments, observations? director nesbit. >> thank you. miriam nesbit. office of government services. i'm going to go back to the logs. earlier there's been a little bit of discussion about the foia portal that -- a project that's currently under construction. one important feature of that is tracking that directly brings in every single data point that are agencies are required to make in their annual foia reports. and that tracking process would

be available to any agency that participated. certainly that would be a good feature in terms of consistency, coherence and also having data in one place that could be available not only to congress, to the agencies, to the public but just would really help particularly those agency that right now -- in fact, that's one reason commerce was so interested in participating is because they know they don't have the proper tracking ability, you know, in every component of commerce. so i think that's going to be a real helpful feature. >> is there anything commerce can do toin courage use of the portal since it is voluntary? members, for example, who sit on the appropriations committee and things look that? >> the portal certainly came up at our hearing.

and one thing congress asked on the committee is to raise awareness with b it and to express a support of the roll out of the portal. senator leahy -- in general technology is an area where he always looks to find ways to improve access and information. that is something i think that can be initially done now in terms of talking about it, encouraging these agencies to go forward with it and looking and seeing how figtive it is. >> yes, matt. i know tegan referred earlier to the usefulness of that office and that more requesters should take advantage of it. and i just wanted to echo that and also to compliment the hard work that mariam is doing. she's a bright star in this world doing fantastic work. she's helped out the coroner's

office with several constituent requests directly. so we wanted to just thank her for the good work that she's doing. >> teagan, would mr. isaacs consider recommending to agencies based on the lack of conformity, lack of usability of formats, et cetera, that they migrate to the port al again? >> that's actually one thing we are looking forward to, we are having some from ep about the d. i think it's supposed to be launched in october of this year and i think if that is successful, then that is something that we would look into and encourage aegt sis to participate in. >> yes, sir. >> we heard earlier i think during the last panel about some

of the progress that was made after an additional appropriation was made to state specifically for foia purposes. are you hearing that the problem is capacity? that they don't have the funding to get this stuff how much of the noncompliance is of capacity that they have and secrecy that is still persuasive? after all these tax breaks, bring us a bunch of new revenue, can we throw it all at foia or do we really have to hit those guys over the head and tell them they is to start taking it seriously. >> i can only tell whau it var office you work at. i would say more important the professionals that there's been

a recent effort in making those positions more available and to understand the importance of that particular office. those are some of the things where money add resources can help. some of it is culture i'd to what that particular agency might be doing. in the national security area, obviously there are unique surgeries that to some extent there's also a need i think for a cultural change, to reprioritize what the president said in his memorandum and everyone knows approach they should be taken to foia. i don't know if that's been done across the government yet. >> another this evening you particularly mentioned state that i think we need to focus, not just congress but erch in the foia community is a problem with referring because a lot of

agencies i think are unfairly making progress by reducing their back log by referring requests to other agencies. i know that's a big problem for the state department. it's hard for requesters because certainly vietnam haven't been one for self years, it's difficult to even be able to track your requests. if you don't know that it's been closed out at the agency you missionly made the request and i think if you're not cloing the requests, addition alg resources are not really helping. and i think that's something we need to look into, see if there's's a way to fix that. i thou the foia portal is something we are looking into as a specific concern. >> reasons for back logs and delays, politics, homeland

security, culture, referral problems, resources, data tracking and we can keep going, suggested a comprehensive centralized look by some sort of independent commission might really be useful. yes, ma'am. >> hi. i'm studying the freedom of information act of china's national government. i'm very curious that according to your work experience, what are the most tours and legal tours you're using to overcome the information from the signaturecy side? thank you. >> ooh. that's a good question. >> is this question what tools congress is using? >> the best political and legal tools that can be used to keep the agencies faithful to

administrating the law. >> oversight. we have a wonderful system of p separation of powers. through congressional oversight we're able to do a lot of that, increasing transparency and talk directly to agency official ps about what they're doing to provide information to the public. and obviousry the legislative process. again, in this area as you've seen because in is a bipt issue, it is a huge tool because you have many members who have different views on many, many issues. that's been extremely helpful in terms of the progress we've made in the last decade on foia issues. >> other comments? >> i would definitely second the oversight comment, which is the primary purpose of our committee. and i think it is very important because the law as written is a

very good law and the problem is enforcing it. if you call attention to the issues, the agencies start paying more attention and they know they can't continue to do these or if there are problems that congress needs to know about, that's something we get from interactions in hearings. even with this report, there are a lot of problems that may not be a particular agency's fault but it is something we need to work on because it is a big problem for the requesters and for government transparency. i think in terms of our hearings, i think it's been very useful just do get the public more aware of what rights they have under foia and certainly the foia community and the pressure that they put on agencies to comply with the law are very useful tools for them. >> on the subject of oversight,

obviously there's a difference in the oversight of structure does facilitate that but independent oversight could be done by an administration, a board, a commission, some other kind of agency in a number of provences in china have that sort of a council set up to provide assistance and oversight. but also the courts. you asked about legal tools, a previously before lunch i think vivid vividly illustrated how the courts come to the aid of requesters when agencies simply refuse to follow the law. and we do have also a history of independence of the judiciary and supremacy of the judiciary as a final arbiter on these things. so both of those i think have worked quite well. >> well, you've been standing a long time. >> no problem. >> i'm a writer and researcher,

filed my first freedom of information request in 1991. i'm pleased to say it's not still pending. but two comments. one, and this is just to expand on your point, ms. grigsby, about chairman leahy's point about press releases being about what governor does right and foia maybe being about what government doesn't do right. i think foia should be expanded to tell the public more broadly what the government does and kind of what the government thinks. and i think because many of my requests have been in the national security realm, one of the things that is enlight i don't know -- enlightening about the documents that you do receive is they show the complexities -- the very hard decisions that policy makers have to consider. in speaking with our previous

questioner about china, for example. the multi- -- the various aspects of china policy, whether it's north korea or trade or otherwise. so i think it's -- we look at the very positive and the very negative but there's broad public interest but perhaps not easily quantifiable public benefit in understanding government policy more broadly and the trade-offs. i guess my second comment as a long-time requester is one more broadly focused to all of you and is to say that what i'm hearing with this panel and previous panels that we've had here, i'm struck by how much of what occurs -- while there's bipartisan consensus in the congress about the right of americans to access information, there seems to be a kind of a bipartisan or a cross-administration tendency within the agencies to ignore

the law. and so what strikes me about that is despite -- i mean, i've been at this for 20 years. the same issues pop up with regard to foia. and in technical tparticular th. this has been something since tom was working on the hill in the 1970s. this issue is endemic with the agencies. you say it does vary by agencies. some agencies particularly that don't deal with national security handle things in a how much more expeditious way. i guess what i'm trying to ask you to consider a more broad issue and i know i think this commission might be a way to get at this. but what -- how do we address this problem? to me it seems a question not only of the professionals that administer these programs within the agencies but in fact a senior leadership issue. the fact that the justice department would represent that

they have no records when they're actually having records as a policy issue to me says there's no way the attorney general would have approved of such a policy, that only in light of the lack of senior leadership issue on this does that kind of a policy come forward. i'd like you from your position in the legislative branch to speak to the problem of senior leadership on this. when i speak to senior leadership i'm talking about agency heads, department heads and maybe the number twos and how we get that kind of focus on foia. thank you. >> thank you for your comments. and i agree with much of what you have said. i think in terms of the kind of i guess the deep challenges of foia that we see over and over again as you mentioned i think is kind of an all of the above approach. you covered the concept of something outside of the government, like the commission that we talked about earlier being a potential way of

addressing that, the role of congress being a way of addressing that and i think you're exactly right about the leadership issue. one thing we have seen in the last few years has been a recommitment from the attorney general and from the president to the presumption of openness in government. i think that is very important. i think there has to be this kind of push-pull dynamic where you have both a commitment from your leadership coming down to the folks who handle foia requests about the need to make sure you're being more open and accessible and then up need the pull from congress and from outside the government. one ning have i found is that folks who don't necessarily deal with foia on a regular basis don't appreciate how foia impacts whatever it is that they do and how access of information -- you talked about the importance of the public seeing the decision making process and understanding how complex issues are. no one wants to show again when they mess up. sometimes their reaction is to keep the secret, whereas perhaps

if the public knew more about the complexity of the issue, there might be a very different attitude about that. that is something that goes beyond just foia but again comes from leadership perspective that i think can make for better policy. i think it's an all of the above time thing. we've made some progress but there's much more work to be done. i think many people feel information is kind of the enemy in terms bhaf thof what they wa do. >> that exchange is really, i think, thought provoking.

we have historically going back to the 60s in congress for freedom of information open government. and i think going back to the '60s we've had a bipartisan recalcitrance on the part of the executive branch. not always opposition but recalcitrance. one of the things to reflect on the obama administration where the president and attorney general have more than once stated and renewed commitment to foia administration and open government, and then to have the kinds of reports that dan wrote an article on the subject and various groups who come out with analyses. obviously not painting as rosy a picture. when you think of the problems that arise under an administration that has such a publicly stated commitment to changing the culture, towards openness, and still the problems that happen when the lawsuits are filed, when the requests are

made, it does suggest that even after 40 years it's still a long-term problem for the future. matt? >> i'll be very brief in this point. but i think we will not have succeeded in getting foia an open government to the place it needs to be until requesters are treated quite simply as customers. and i think they are treated far too often as numbers, as nuisances, and as problems, and i think until they are treated as customers this is something senator cornyn says over and over again, we will have these problems persist. >> you see, texas never had that problem about having to worry about agencies following the attorney general's advisory memoranda on the subject because he had the ability to sue their butts if they didn't follow his

directive. and senator cornyn, as attorney general cornyn, did that rather vigorously against government agencies and municipalities. a very different structure. >> i'm a federal worker, as i know many of the other folks in the audience are, and i think there's a hole in an otherwise wonderful day of program there's isn't more federal worker representation. just to comment on the last comment and responses. it seems to me that there's a widespread view that any delay or limitation in foia response is intentional abfi skags. talking about a policy document sitting on the shelf and that specific document has been requested and the agency's refusing to turn it over, that seems true. if it's a case where there's a request made for all e-mails from the top three leaders of a department on a very broad topic over the course of the entire

teener of the leader, which is a case i've seen over and over again in my work, a delay is merely priorization and attempts to fulfill that foia request while continuing to attempt to do the work that the agency is otherwise required to do. i do think that's a point that needs to be recognized. >> that's a good point. i added to my list two other factors for agency delays, records management issues because even if they know where -- sometimes they don't know where they are, they have trouble finding them, and the expansive requests are just very large. you've been very patient. yes, ma'am? >> hi, i'm a student and i have one forward looking question for each of you, if you want and that is, what is the most important foia matter that will be brought before congress through the rest of this year? and how likely do you think it that is foia will abmebe amende >> great question to wrap up on,

thank you. starting on the far end, krysta? do you want to take a little time? no, you can handle this one. this is -- by the way, i should say, this is such a simple question for staff, for anyone in washington, for my dog in fact to answer about what congress is going to do this year. i mean, we could have stopped. yes. >> i would expect the most important foia issue that will come up is related to the post-millner reaction and whether anything is done or not done. i know in the context of the cybersecurity legislation that's being moved that you know that's a very prominent issue and so i think that's a very real one that congress will face. as to the likelihood of something being passed i would say i don't know. >> tegan? >> i agree with krista, that is

what is most likely to come up. what i would really like to see, and hopefully we will be able to do this this year, is to encourage more agencies with pro active disclosure because i think that would help requesters, it would help agencies because you wouldn't be getting requests for stuff that you've already released in having to go through files again and to your point earlier, we definitely recognize that foia agent -- foia offices often don't have the resources they need. and i think from a congressional standpoint, even without legislation, one thing we need to do is to educate requesters to make the best requests possible because that can really streamline the process. professional requesters are people who do it all the time. i did it for three years. they get a format down that works very well but often if you're a private citizen and seeking information you might not have it in the right form or worded correctly, and that can

cause excessive delays in something that we are looking to do especially with the citizens guide and with staff training on foia issues is to make it easier for requesters to make good requests, which also makes it easier for the agencies to process. >> yes? anything? >> i agree with all of the comments that have been said. i think it's definitely post-millner and probably cybersecurity together, possibly separately. i would add another caveat, there may be another way how to address millner and doing changes to exemptions, too. another area where congress may explore looking at los angeles that deals with legislative exemptions in foia and figuring out i way to carefully craft that so as we're getting new exemptions there's some built-in protections for access to health and safety information. >> let me close with three observations.

first, a point of personal privilege. we've talked a lot about oversight in congress, congressional staff. i was not here this morning, for which i apologize, but i did want to say, back in the early '70s, when i was a young staffer, fully fasht haicial har on my head a wonderful sight to behold, we had oversight hearings and worked on legislation and one of our witnesses from the great northwest, young sue long, a statistician, in a battle with the internal revenue service came in and testified, and was really inspiring for the senate judiciary committee, and i think at that time kind of became my personal muse in my own commitment to pursuit of open government and foia. sue, i want to acknowledge that and thank you for that. secondly, on the subject of

predict what congress will do, i think we've all suggested that it's impossible to do. but i can make one prediction, and that is, it is highly likely that next year during sunshine week, the washington college of law will, once again, host a program on freedom of information day celebration and the collaboration on government secrecy will assemble a fantastic panel that may even include some of our panelists yet again to discuss what congress did or didn't do in the intervening time and what the new plans for the new congress and new administration, whoever that might be, could be. finally, i think the interesting discussion, sort of teeing up our next panel, which is the hot issue of today on the hill is millner and exception 3. stay tuned. it won't be long before the

panel focuses on that subject. thanks to each of you for coming out here, for participating. very educational. very informative, and a lot of fun for me, too. thank you. [ applause ] >> tom i wanted to have a special thanks for the moderator and the four panelists today. to the best of anyone's recollection, this is the first time that all four corners of capitol hill has been represented, house, senate, majority staff, minority staff, to focus on foia matters and we know that foia matters coming up. we hope we've establishes i a new cgs tradition, speaking of next year, and would extend a standing or sitting invitation right at this moment to you folks from each of your vantage points to come back because nothing is as good as having all four parts,