The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
REPORT OF THE EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY COMMISSION ON
ITS ADMINISTRATION OF THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT, 5 U.S.C.
Section 552 for FY 2000(1)
- Basic Information Regarding FOIA Report
- Name, title, address and telephone number of person
to be contacted with questions about the report
A. Jacy Thurmond, Jr.
Assistant Legal Counsel
EEOC
Office of Legal Counsel
1801 L Street, NW, 6th floor
Washington, DC 20507
(202) 663-4640
- Electronic address for report on the World Wide Web
http://www.eeoc.gov/foia
- How to obtain a copy of the report in paper form
A paper copy of the report may be requested by submitting a
written request to:
A. Jacy Thurmond, Jr.
Assistant Legal Counsel
EEOC
Office of Legal Counsel
1801 L Street, NW, 6th floor
Washington, DC 20507
(202) 663-4640
- How To Make A FOIA Request
FOIA requests should be made in accordance with the Commission's
regulations at 29 C.F.R. 1610.7.
- Names, address, and telephone numbers of all
individual agency components and offices that receive FOIA requests
See 29 C.F.R. 1610.4 and the agency's FOIA web page at
http://www.eeoc.gov/foia for the EEOC FOIA contacts.
- Brief description of the agency's response time ranges
The average response time ranges were 10-20 working days. The
median number of calendar days to process a FOIA request was 15.
The median number of calendar days to process a FOIA appeal was
21.
- Brief description of why some requests are not granted
Many FY 2000 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests received
by the Commission were for materials contained in the Commission's
investigative case files that involved charges of discrimination
filed pursuant to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as
amended, 42 U.S. C. 2000e, et seq.; the Age
Discrimination in Employment Act, 29 U.S.C. 621-633; the Equal Pay
Act, 29 U.S.C. 206(d); and the Americans with Disabilities Act, 42
U.S.C. 12101-213. Sections 706 (b) and 709 (e) of Title VII, 42
U.S.C. 2000e-5(b) and 8 (e), and section 107 of the ADA, 42 U.S.C.
12117, prohibit Commission employees from making Title VII or ADA
charges, conciliation materials, required reports and case file
information public. In certain instances, parties to the charge are
entitled to access to the disclosable portions of the charge
file.(2)
- Definitions Used In The Report
The definitions set forth in the Department of Justice guidance
were followed.
- Exemption 3 Statutes
The exemption 3 statutes relied on were sections 706 (b) and 709
(e) of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended, 42
U.S.C. 2000e-5 (b) and 8 (e), and section 107 of the ADA, 42 U.S.C.
12117. These sections prohibit Commission employees from making
Title VII or ADA charges, conciliation materials, required reports
and case file information public.
The Commission's use of the third exemption has been upheld by
the courts. The landmark case supporting the Commission's position
is EEOC v. Associated Dry Goods Corp., 449 U.S. 590 (1981).
In FY 2000, one court upheld EEOC's use of this exemption.
Victor Sparrow v. EEOC, Civil Action No. 99CVO1421 (D.D.C.
October 4, 1999).
- Initial FOIA Access Requests
- Number of initial requests (total of the numbers in lines one
and two, minus the number in line three, should equal the number in
four)
- Number of requests pending as of end of preceding fiscal year
1,406
- Number of requests received during current fiscal year
15,729
- Number of requests processed during current fiscal year
16,060
- Number of requests pending as of end of current fiscal year
1,075 (This line has also been entered on line
VII.B.1.)
- Disposition of initial requests
- Number of total grants 1,936
- Number of partial grants(3)
10,830
- Number of denials(4)
1,782
- Number of times each exemption was used (counting each
exemption once per request)
- Exemption 1 0
- Exemption 2 43
- Exemption 3 1,367
- Exemption 4 21
- Exemption 5 9,501
- Exemption 6 458
- Exemption 7(A) 899
- Exemption 7(B) 0
- Exemption 7(C) 1,295
- Exemption 7(D) 90
- Exemption 7(E) 14
- Exemption 7(F) 0
- Exemption 8 0
- Exemption 9 0
- Other reasons for nondisclosure (total) 1,512
- no records 536
- referrals 109
- request withdrawn 195
- fee-related reason 45
- records not reasonably described 10
- not a proper FOIA request for some other reason 27
- not an agency record 6
- duplicate request 82
- Others 502
- Appeals
- Number of appeals
- Number of appeals received during current fiscal year
393
- Number of appeals processed during current fiscal year
393
- Disposition of appeals
- Number of initial determinations completely upheld
217
- Number of initial determinations partially reversed
106
- Number of initial determinations completely reversed
19
- Number of times each exemption was used (counting each
exemption once per request)
- Exemption 1 0
- Exemption 2 0
- Exemption 3 65
- Exemption 4 2
- Exemption 5 166
- Exemption 6 4
- Exemption 7(A) 74
- Exemption 7(B) 0
- Exemption 7(C) 37
- Exemption 7(D) 8
- Exemption 7(E) 0
- Exemption 7(F) 0
- Exemption 8 0
- Exemption 9 0
- Other reasons for nondisclosure (total) 51
- no records 6
- referrals 2
- request withdrawn 1
- fee-related reason 0
- records not reasonably described 1
- not a proper FOIA request for some other reason 0
- not an agency record 0
- duplicate request 2
- other 39
- Compliance With Time Limits/Status of Pending Requests
- Median(5)
- Ordinary requests
- number of requests processed 15,765
- median number of calendar days to process 15
- Complex requests
- number of requests processed 0
- median number of days to process 0
- Requests accorded expedited processing
- number of requests processed 295
- median number of days to process 3
- Appeals
- number of appeals processed 393
- median number of calendar days to process 21
- Status of pending requests
- Number of requests pending as of end of current fiscal year
1,075 (Enter this number from line V.A.4)
- Median(6) number of days that
such requests were pending as of that date 15
- Comparison With Previous Year (Optional)
- Comparison of number of requests received 15,838
- Comparison of numbers of requests processed 15,751
- Comparison of median number of days requests were pending as
of end of fiscal year 15.5 .
- Other statistics significant to agency N/A
- Other
- Costs/FOIA Staffing
- Staffing levels.
- Number of full-time FOIA personnel 7
- Number of personnel with part-time or occasional FOIA duties
172 and total work-years 36.79
- Total number of personnel (in work-years) 43.79(7)
- Total costs (including staff and all resources).
- FOIA processing(8)(including
appeals) $1,674,183.00
- Litigation-related activities (estimated) $0.00
- Total costs $1,674,183.00
- Comparison with previous year (optional)
$1,555,180.00
- Fees
- Total amount of fees collected by agency for processing
requests $35,961.84
- Percentage of total costs N/A
- FOIA Regulations
See Attachment A.
1. This report is submitted to the Attorney
General of the United States pursuant to 5 U.S.C. 552 (e)(1). The
format utilized in this report adheres to the format recommended by
the Department of Justice.
2. An example of non-disclosable material in
a charge file would be the internal intra-agency deliberative
documents. These documents are generally withheld under the fifth
exemption to the FOIA, 5 U.S.C. section 552 (b)(5).
3. This category only includes those
situations where some records have been released and an exemption
has been asserted to others; it does not include situations where
some documents were released but others could not be found - that
would be a total grant.
4. Denials are based on the exemptions listed
in V.B.4 or the "other reasons for nondisclosure" listed in para.
V.B.5.
5. The median number is the middle, not the
average, number. For example, the median number of 3, 7, 20, 21 and
24 is 20, while the average is 15.
6. See footnote 5.
7. For example, if each of 4 employees
devotes 50% of his or her time to FOIA, 4 people and 2 total work
years would be reported.
8. Personnel costs were estimated by
multiplying the percentage used for computing IX.A.3. by the
average annual salary rates for those persons.
This page was last modified on January 30, 2001.
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