The FOIA backlog continued to grow last year

By Justin Doubleday, Fed. News Network, July 22, 2022

The federal Freedom of Information Act request backlog continued to rise in fiscal 2021, but FOIA offices were able to make a dent in the backlog of administrative appeals last year.

The Justice Department’s Office of Information Policy (OIP) runs down the numbers in its analysis of agency chief FOIA officer fiscal 2021 reports.

Agencies received 838,164 FOIA requests in fiscal 2021, a 6% increase above the total received in fiscal 2020. And the FOIA backlog increased by just over 8% to a total of 153,227 requests by the end of fiscal 2021.

A request is considered backlogged when it has been pending at an agency longer than the statutory time to respond, which is typically 20 working days, but can be up to 30 working days in unusual circumstances.

DOJ’s 49,959 delayed requests made up 33% of the backlog alone. The Department of Homeland Security, which typically receives the most FOIA requests of any agency and was able to make a dent in its backlog last year, accounted for 16% of the backlog at the end of fiscal 2021, while the Defense Department represented 11% of the backlog.

Read more here.