referrals that are going on. and i think we are very interested in considering legislation. but we would prefer to get this information from an oversight and research view instead of legislation and then pass legislation to fix those issues in the future. >> well, perhaps we'll have some other observations on that. but if we don't i'll come back to that subject. let's see. i think you were -- let's start with the lady on the left and then we'll just go right and left. >> sure. hi. is this on? hi. i'm cindy cafero and this is mostly for tiguan. tegan. i'm sorry. thank you all very much for being here. it's really incredibly valuable for us to have your insights. as for chairman issa's report, which came out yesterday, i'm sure that the grades were very carefully thought out and a lot of consideration went into them. one thing that was a bit of a surprise to some of us looking at the grades was that particularly in the lower levels

it appeared that perhaps to us, who hadn't seen all the information, it appeared that there were some agencies that were at the same very bad level who had made very different responses, that there were some agencies who hadn't responded at all who ended up with an f and that there were some who had responded but in the wrong format and it seemed a little surprising that those would be sins of the same level, if that makes sense. so certainly not asking you to go into detail about all of the very hard work i'm sure you all did on that. but it would be form and function -- of course form and substance are two different things and the form is very important. but it would be wonderful perhaps if it was possible to distinguish between the agencies that have the information available and have provided the information, they just didn't quite get it right as to the fo

form, and the agencies that just aren't trying at all. so it's really more of a comment than anything else. we really appreciate the thought you are putting into this. this is our pet area, and whenever congress is paying attention to it it's very helpful for all of us. >> well, thank you. and we went through the methodology in the report. our original request asked them to produce it in an electronic format, and that is something the agencies should be readily able to do. we did note in the report the agencies that produced logs and agencies that did not. but that's certainly something we'll take into consideration in future oversight. >> thank you. >> yes, ma'am. >> hi. i'm ginger mccall. i'm the director of the open government project at the electronic privacy information center. miss grigsby, i know you spoke about the d.o.j. foia regs. sort of the most pressworthy issue there was this idea they were going to simply deny the existence of documents.

but those regs aside from that, even if the doj is to back off of that position, the regs were just bad overall. they made it much more difficult for requesters to obtain fee statuses. they made it more difficult to get expedited processing and they made it more difficult for requesters to get requests in general. we haven't seen anything come out of the doj about this. i was wondering what the status of that is. whether they plan on addressing some of those other issues. >> okay. thank you. the justice department's probably the best place to answer your question. i can tell you the issues with the exclusions that come up at our hearing, we asked about that and we were told the regulation is being finalized and we would get more information from the department about that. i haven't seen the other regs. i know there were a lot of issues and concerns that many in the requester community in particular had and the chairman had as well. we'll be looking to see what they come up with. but i have no further insight on

that at this point. >> it's particularly problematic to us and we submitted comments on this, because the department of justice is supposed to set the example for the rest of the agencies and for them to have such repressive foia regulations it's just very problematic, it sets a very bad example. so it's just something we would want to call your attention to. >> thank you for your comment. >> not a particularly good example set when only 3 out of 40 subentities of the department of justice responded to congressman issa's inquiry as well. they're batting pretty low percentage today. >> thank you. >> sue. sue long. >> i have another question regarding the logs, and i apologize because i didn't see the report that came out yesterday. i was traveling down here. as to the actual logs themselves that you got, the case-by-case information, has the committee made any decisions about whether

or not that's considered something they feel they can release, or is it considered proprietary? >> that's something we're still deciding. many of the logs that were produced contain very confidential information including addresses, personal names. one concern was that we did not want to dissuade people from making foia requests because that information might be available. i think a lot of the logs are already available online. i know the government attic did an identical request to ours and posted the logs they received online, which i actually think is very useful because as a citizen and not congress the logs should be properly exempted. all the privacy concerns should have been taken care of before

they were released. but i think that that's something we're still considering given that many of the agencies have a lot of very private information in those and we don't want to compromise that. >> i think it would be actually -- it's somewhat difficult to even find out what fields of information they track. and so in fact having -- and maybe that was in the report. a more detailed description of the contents of logs and, you know, what a field means because we have in fact had some difficulty in obtaining just descriptive information. >> that's something that we have gone into in the report. there's very wide discrepancy between what agencies are tracking and what format.

but whenever we did collapse specific agencies and specific logs with information i think that we would not be against putting out even more detail and possibly putting out what was contained in the logs without the information that's in them so that you could get more information. one of the problems, though, is that a lot of the spreadsheets had a lot of fields that were just blank. there are some agencies that had separate sections in their excel spreedsheets to list exemptions and whether records were granted and they were just blank for all requests. so i think one problem is if we give that information it's very misleading because just because they have that in the log doesn't mean they're putting the data in when they should be. >> good point. any information about empty fields? also very valuable. thank you. >> so i recall. >> steve winters. local researcher. i'd like to ask a question about

the response of -- in congress to perhaps a widely spread public perception. every time i go to a conference about cyber security and the u.s. government, the wikileaks incident is still very much on the table. now, to focus on one specific thing, the edited video commented that was released by wikileaks under the title of "collateral 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 the press had been asking for that information for a couple of years with foia in the sx and getting absolutely nowhere. i think they were interested to see this video when it was relea released. i think the perception of the bub public is they had a right to see this video -- in terms of

trying to get away from this whack a mole, correct me if i'm wrong but i don't think that under what you've described that if the whole thing were gone through under the current situation that the pentagon would feel they need to release that information to reuters. so therefore i think the public has seen information illicitly released which they think should have been released but wouldn't be released under the current regimen of foia even as you suggest leahy and others are trying to get it. and i recognize it's an important issue because of the issues of national security. but can you tell me how congress responds to what is a widely held public perception? >> i think it's difficult to address outside of the particular facts of any one particular incident. it's an important balance to make sure we're protecting genuine 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. in terms of responding to the public perception, it's just i think listening to the public and making sure there are particular incidents, and i'm not addressing those facts, but there are have been cases in the past where because congress has heard from the public that there were concerns about something being withheld that that was actually addresseby it's a diff scenario, but you could look at the wall street reform bill and that was what was done there. because there was a public outcry about an exempon was included in the bill my boss at the time and senator leahy worked together and passed, you know, a roll back of that exemption.

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 thea 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. that's very troubling because if it's information that's been released by the government in the past that certainly raises the question why that information can't continuity to be released. >> any other comments, observations? director nisbitt. >> thank you. miriam nisbitt, office of government information services. earlier there's been a little

bit of discussion about the foia portal -- project that's currently under construction. one important feature of that is tracking that direct ly brings n every single data point agencies are required to make in their formal report. that tracking process would be available to any agency. that's certainly a good feature in terms of terms of consistency and information, to having data that would particularly help those agencies that right now -- in fact, that's one reason commerce was so interested in participating, is because they know they have the proper

tracking ability, you know, in even -- i think that's going a real helpful feature. >> is there anything congress can do to encourage use of the porta portal? since it is voluntary. >> i can say the portal came up at our hearing. and one thing congress has done is raise awareness about it and express support for the roll jut of the portal. senator leahy is also known as the side burst setup. 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 then looking at it and saying how effective it is. >> matt. >> tegan referred earlier to the

office of government information services and the usefulness of that office and that more requesters should take advantage of it. i wanted to echo that and also to complement the hard work marion is doing. she's a bright star in this work doing fantastic work. she's helped out stoesh cornyn's office with constituent requests. we'd like to thank her for the good work she's doing. >> tegan, would isaacs consider recommending to agencies based on the lack of usability of formats that they migrate to the portal and he doesn't ask this question next year? >> we are looking to have someone from epa come and talk about the details of the foia

portal. miriam will be there too to give some information. but i think it's supposed to be launched in october of this year. and i think if that is something that is definitely something we would look into and encourage agencies to participate in. >> good. yes, sir. >> hi there. brian bardwell. we eared earlier about some of the progress that was made after an additional misappropriation was made specifically for foia purposes. when you talk to the executive branch are you hearing the problem is capacity, they don't have the funding to get this stuff done? how many of the non-compliance is the capacity they have and how much is this culture of secrecy that -- after these tax breaks bring us new revenue can we just throw it all at invoicea and expect to see compliance or do we have to hit these guys

over the head and tell them they have to start taking this seriously? >> i think it varies, depending which agency they talk to and certainly some of it is resources, and i would say probably more important than -- prioritizing who sits in the offices. and to also understand the importance of that particular office. those are some things where money and resources can help. some of it is culture and some of it is i think culture tied to what that particular agency might be doing. again in the national security area there are unique issues in terms of secrecy that are different than some agencies have to deal with. so to some extend there's also a need i think probably again for a culture change, a culture shift to preprioritize what the president said in his memorandum.

and what the attorney general said in his so everybody knows that's the approach that should be taken in foia. i don't know if that's been done across the government yet. >> and another thing, you particularly mentioned state. we need to foegs focus not just congress, everyone in the foia committee has a 3r0b wiproblem referrals. some agencies are referring all their requests to other agencies. that's also a problem for requesters. certainly having been one for several years it's difficult to track your request. if you don't know it's been closed out at the agency that you initially made your request but it's pending in five or six others and i think that that's one thing where if you're not closing the request then additional resources aren't really helping and you're just kind of shunting it off to different agencies and i think

that's something we need to look into to see if there's a way to fix that. i think the foia portal may be able to help with that and that's something we are looking into as a specific concern. >> we have reasons for backlogs and delays. politics. homeland security. culture. especially intelligence. referral problems. resources. data tracking inadequacies. 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 aviva. i'm studying the freedom of information efforts of chinese national government. some very curious that according to your work experience what are the most common political tools and legal tools you're using to

overcome the information solution from the agency side. >> ooh. that's a good question. >> is the question what tools congress is using? >> what are the best political and legal tools that can be used to keep the agencies faithful to administering the law? >> obviously, oversight. you know, we have a wonderful system of separation of powers. so obviously through the congressional oversight we're able to do a lot of that. in both increasing transparency in having hearings when we talk to agency officials in terms of what they're doing to provide information to the public. and of course obviously the legislative process. so i think those are the most important tools. again, in this area as 1/2 you've seen, because that is a bipartisan issue that's obviously a huge tool because you have members who have many different views on many, many issues who are very closely aligned on access to government and foia and that has been

extremely helpful in terms of the progress we've made in the last decade on foia issues. >> >> 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 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 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 particular the delays. 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 thing i have 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 of what they want to do. >> that exchange is really, i think, thought provoking. we have historically going back

to the 60s a bipartisan supporting congress for freedom of information/open government. i think going back to the 60s we've had a bipartisan recalcitrance on the part of the executive branch. >> well, that exchange is really, i think, thought provoking. we have historically going back to the '60s bipartisan support and we have a bipartisan part of the opposition. that's one of the things to reflect on the obama administration where the president and attorney general have more than once stated a 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.