DC Special Police Commissions

To Whom It May Concern:

Pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act, I hereby request the following records:

This request is brought by Big Local News along with a collaboration of news organizations, including the Invisible Institute, ABC Owned TV Stations, KQED, MuckRock, and other news organizations. Big Local News is a program of Stanford University’s Journalism and Democracy Initiative and helps journalists collect, process and analyze public data.

I am seeking electronic data maintained by DC regarding Special Police Officers (including Campus and University Special Police) that apply and are granted commissions by the District, and such commissions that are later stripped away.

Please provide any databases or spreadsheets containing any of the following information:

Commissions:
* Unique ID of SPO
* Date of Commission
* Name of Special Police Officer
* Agency of Special Police Officer
* Demographics of Special Police Officer

Revocations of Commissions:
* Unique ID of SPO
* Date of Commission
* Date of Revocation
* Agency of Special Police Officer
* Reason for Revocation

If your data system contains data elements not listed above, please include them in the response, provided they are releasable under the law. On the other hand, we recognize some of the information we are asking for may not be tracked by your system. If that is the case, we are willing to accept as many of the data elements as your agency maintains. If some records are more readily available, we are happy to receive partial information as soon as possible while the remaining request is processed.

In addition to the data elements listed, we request documentation necessary to understand and interpret the data, including but not limited to record layouts, data dictionaries, code sheets, lookup tables, etc.

Our preference is to receive structured data provided in a machine-readable text file, such as delimited or fixed-width formats. We can also handle a variety of other data formats including SQL databases, Excel workbooks and MS Access. If there are additional formats your agency would prefer to provide, please let us know.

Electronic records such as databases are public under DC FOIA. As the D.C. Court of Appeals has explained:

Electronic records have been subject to D.C. FOIA since the Council extended the statute's coverage through the Freedom of Information Amendment Act of 2000, D.C. Law 13–283, 48 D.C. Reg. 1917 (2001). The Council stated that its intent, “in keeping with the general purpose of FOIA,” was “to provide the public greater access to information, improve the effectiveness of the law, and encourage better government responsiveness to requests for public records.” Committee on Government Operations, D.C. Council, Report on Bill No. 13–829 at 1 (2000). As amended, D.C. FOIA provides that “[i]n responding to a request for records pursuant to this section, a public body shall make reasonable efforts to search for the records in electronic form or format, except when the efforts would significantly interfere with the operation of the public body's automated information system.” D.C. Code Ann. § 2–532(a–2). (Fraternal Order of Police v. District of Columbia, 139 A.3d 853, 866 n.29 (D.C. 2016).)

We are seeking this information as a news media organization on a matter of public interest concerning the conduct of government. As such, we ask for a waiver of all fees because the information requested can be considered as primarily benefiting the general public D.C. Code Ann. § 2-532(b). If you do deny the fee waiver request, please do not incur fees above $100.

Thank you

Sam Stecklow
Journalist
Invisible Institute

The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes.

In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 20 business days, as the statute requires.

Sincerely,

Sam Stecklow