Most people think of the FOI Act in terms of requesters, people who write to agencies seeking information. But the Act goes further to make information public. It mandates publication requirements and reading room requirements. Newer legislation requires that those materials be available electronically and that the government take other steps to make information easily available to you.

The FOI Act requires agencies to publish in the Federal Register any regulations or general policy statements. For instance, each agency will publish its regulations telling the public what rules it will follow in processing FOI requests. Final regulations are published in the Code of Federal Regulations available at law libraries. The Government Printing Office Electronic Information Enhancement Act of 1993 requires GPO to make these materials available on line as well.⁹

The FOI Act also requires agencies to make available for inspection or copying final opinions, staff instructions and other information which would affect a member of the public. This is often called the “reading room” requirement.

The Electronic FOI Improvements Act of 1996 greatly expanded the requirements that the government take affirmative steps to make information available. It requires government agencies to make available in electronic reading rooms information created after November 1996 that would be required to be placed in reading rooms. The law further requires that agencies identify FOI requests that have been or are likely to become subject to future requests and make the responses to those requests available electronically as well as on paper. The agencies must index these records for the public and by the end of 1999 the indexes were to be available electronically.

The newer Act also instructs agencies to develop reference guides to help the public access their information. These must be available both in the reading rooms and online.

Next section: Who may use the FOI Act?