FOIA March Madness 2019 - FOIA funding, staffing, and activities (National Endowment for the Arts)

Dear Mr. Lipton:

This e-mail responds to your request for records under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. §552. Your request has been assigned file number F19-024. In your below e-mail, you requested:

***Budget materials*** There are no budget plans for the years 2017, 2018 and 2019.

- - - > > > for the years 2017, 2018, and 2019, all budget materials or plans applicable to offices responsible for processing and response to FOIA requests and appeals submitted to this Bureau and its offices.
***Staffing orders/reports/contacts*** All FOIA requests and appeals are centralized for this National Endowment for the Arts. FOIA administration is processed in the Office of General Counsel.
- - - > > > for the years 2017 and 2018, staffing reports and plans, including the count of employee numbers and for offices responsible for processing and responses to FOIA requests and appeals submitted to this Bureau and its offices.
- If this report is available in a form that includes the total number of hours worked for FOIA personnel, that version would be preferred. We have one FOIA officer, a FOIA Public Liason and a Chief FOIA Officer.
- If reports are available for each month, that version is preferred.
- According to this agency’s “About Us” website (https://www.doi.gov/foia/About-Us): This is not applicable to this agency, this is from the Department of the Interior.
“The Department has decentralized its FOIA operations among 13 bureaus and offices, each of which has a Bureau/Office FOIA Officer leading its separately managed and resourced FOIA Program. Secretarial Order 3244 (November 12, 2002) anchored Bureau/Office FOIA Offices within their respective CIOs' Offices. That order was superseded by Secretarial Order 3309 (December 14, 2010), which replaced Bureau/Office CIOs with Assistant Directors for Information Resources and initiated a series of significant ongoing organizational changes as part of the Department's IT Transformation.
Bureau/office FOIA Officers are responsible for tracking, managing and responding to FOIA requests for records in their organization's possession and control, and administering their organization's FOIA programs. In addition to Bureau/Office FOIA Officers, some bureaus/offices also have Regional FOIA Coordinators and Field Offices that process requests. Some bureaus/offices have their program offices (i.e., the offices whose records are the subject of the requests) prepare the responses to FOIA requests. These responses are reviewed by the FOIA Officer or Regional FOIA Coordinator and the appropriate FOIA attorney (when the decision is to withhold information, make a discretionary release, or deny a fee waiver).”
- - - > > > all staffing reports and plans for the year 2019 - If reports are available for each month, such a version is preferred. There are no staffing reports for the year 2019, please see previous response regarding FOIA personnel.
- - - > > > contact information, including email addresses and phone numbers (if available), for each FOIA officer currently tasked with an open public records request This information is available on our website at FOIA Contacts | NEA<https://www.arts.gov/foia/foia-contacts>

***FOIA requester categories***
- - - > > > for the years 2017 and 2018, the designated category of each requester of a FOIA request to this office, including those assigned to the following categories:
* commercial; 2017-12; 2018-6
* educational and noncommercial scientific institutions; 2017-15; 2018-27
* representative of news media requester; 2017-23; 2018-8
* all other requesters 2017-40; 2018-31
- If this information is kept in an aggregate form including the number of requesters by fee category by year, a copy of this report will suffice to fulfill this element of the request.
***FOIA fee waivers*** There were no fee waivers for the years 2017 and 2018.
- - - > > > for the years 2017 and 2018, the number of fee waivers granted by this office and, if available, the tracking numbers for the FOIA requests to which waivers were granted
***FOIA fee collection*** There were no fees collected for the years of 2017 and 2018.
- - - > > > for the years 2017 and 2018, any report capturing the following information:
* total estimated processing and copy fees quoted to FOIA requesters
* total processing and copy fees collected by this Bureau from each fee category
- If this information is kept in an aggregate form, such as a FOIA log, that material would be sufficient to satisfy the bullet points “FOIA requester categories” and “FOIA fee collection” if it captures the following information:
* FOIA tracking number
* requester fee category
* amount processing and copy fees associated with the request
* the status of the requester’s payment for the request

The responses to your FOIA request are indicated above in RED.

The National Endowment for the Arts is governed by the provisions of the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act, 20 U.S.C. 951 et seq., and the Freedom of Information Act with respect to the release of agency records. In accordance with the NEA's FOIA regulations, 45 C.F.R. 1100.5(b)(1), you may appeal the Agency’s determination. Such an appeal must be made to the Chairman not less than 90 days after the date of receipt of this e-mail, additional information about the appeal process can be found at FOIA| NEA<https://www.arts.gov/freedom-information-act-guide> .

If you would like to discuss our response before filing an appeal to attempt to resolve your dispute, you can contact our FOIA Public Liaison<https://www.arts.gov/foia/foia-contacts> for assistance. If we are unable to resolve your FOIA dispute through our FOIA Public Liaison, the Office of Government Information Services(OGIS), the Federal FOIA Ombudsman office, offers mediation services to help resolve disputes between FOIA requesters and Federal agencies. The contact information for OGIS is:

Office of Government Information Services
National Archives and Records Administration
8601 Adelphi Road-OGIS
College Park, MD 20740-6001
ogis@nara.gov<mailto:ogis@nara.gov>

Please contact me if you have any questions about this response.

Respectfully,
Desiree Flippins

FOIA Officer | Office of the General Counsel

National Endowment for the Arts

400 7th Street SW | Washington DC 20506

flippinsd@arts.gov | 202-682-5746 (p) | 202-682-5572 (fax)

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