so bringing that fully online and fully automated is something that the foia portal would do. extremely important. and kirsten talked about the websites of agency foia offices. in many cases these websites do now have a mechanism for filing a request on line and for tracks a request online. this is great, it's exactly what agencies should be doing. but we shouldn't have to do it 100 different times. in many cases even within a single department there are dozens of components, each of which has a separate foia office. it's outrageous that a requester should have to deal with so many different interfaces in order to seek information from more than one agency. so bringing that together and providing a common interface and a common way for requesters to track where they are, incredibly important things that the foia portal would do, this is not to mention all of the great things that it would do in terms of efficiencies of processing and ogis i think has played a really important role in helping move that project forward. so now i'll talk a bit about the future and i'm going to cou

>> 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

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 o

mention, because not only this panel but earlier there's been a little bit of discussion about the foia portal project that is currently under construction. one important feature of that is tracking that directly brings in every single data point that 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 agencies 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 congress. so i think it's going to be a real helpful feature. >> is there anything congress can do to encourage use of the portal, since it is voluntary? >> i can say the portal certainly came up after hearing, and was testified about that. one thing congress has done, raise and am it's abo

work with the foia module with the epa and the department of commerce which we're very interested in which would allow requesters to submit their request to multiple agencies in a single portal. also what's interesting to us is they would be able to see previously requested and released material. that would be a source for them to see what other agencies have produced in other response to other foias. and we think that's a very valuable tool to the public. and something the agencies should be doing more of. it's a requirement under the electronic foia act of 1996. a lot of agencies are doing a good job in meeting that but some agencies are not frankly posting all the records they should be on their online meeting rooms. one problem is e-foia specifies frequently requested records must be posted but there's no definition of frequent. there's no consistent format. in the future that's something that we would like to recommend agencies do more proactive disclosure and more electronic information posted on their reading rooms. finally, one thing that i also wanted to mention was some staff training that we are working on providing for house staffers who are in a situation they d

work foia is doing including with the epa and department of commerce, which we're very interested in, which would allow requesters to submit their requests to multiple agencies at a single portal and then also this is what is most exciting for suss that they would be able to see previously requested and released material. so that would be a source for them to see what other agencies have produced in response to other foias.wehink that's a ver tool to the public and something the agencies should be doing more of. it's a requirement under the electronic foia act of 1996. a lot of agencies are doing a good job in meeting that but some agencies, frankly, are not posting all of the records that they should be on their online reading rooms. one problem is that e-foia specifies frequently requested records must be posed but there's no definition of frequent. so some agencies comply to doj's guidance with a rule of three and others do not. there's no real consistent format. that's something we would like to recommend agencies do more of, pro active disclosure and more electron being information posted on their reading rooms. and then finally one thing that i also wanted to mention was