Freedom of Information Request Handling
Obtaining and supplying documents through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is challenging and the backlog of public records requests is only growing due to increased scrutiny of public officials and government agencies.
FOIA requires that the public have access to certain undisclosed documents and information upon request. Government agencies of all sizes, across the country, often struggle with the challenges these requests present. Many government agencies still rely on paper-based record keeping or have records stored across several different IT systems. Locating a requested record among many file cabinets in different departments and across multiple IT systems is a time-consuming task, to say the least.
However, by leveraging content analytics, you can enhance your agency’s public record request process and make significant improvements in several key areas:
- Searching for records
- Submitting and delivery of requests
- Improved transparency and reporting
ExtractIQ will process the content of your records across all the different IT systems. The records can be in many formats such as scanned images, office files, CAD files, email messages, audio files, etc. It leaves the records where they are but builds a digital library of index information about the records, which can be searched. It is like implementing your own “Google Search” but on your records and not the Internet. When the analyst performs a search, the system provides details on where all the relevant records can be found with the ability to retrieve them for processing.
How will this help our Organization?
Many benefits will be realized by moving to a solution that digitally transforms the record retrieval management process:
- Increase productivity when searching for requested records and increase the number of records processed per month.
- Improve citizen satisfaction by providing a more responsive service.
- Reduce the number of record requests which fail to meet the target response deadline.
- Ease of evaluation if records are subject to agency exemptions for release.
- Support redaction requirements by identifying Personally Identifiable Information (PII).
How does it work?
You identify the different record sources within your organization. This will span from correspondence and reports to multimedia files. We then define datasets each containing data relevant to the agency. These datasets contain information which might be useful when filtering records responding to a record request. Examples could be Agency departments, office locations, provided services, record types, etc. Any number of datasets can be defined so that references and connections can be made which are specific to the nature of the agency’s business.
ExtractIQ will process the contents of each record and store the extracted metadata in a database. The actual records themselves are left alone; the process just captures useful metadata describing information from within the records content. Any special security assignment for certain types of record will be respected when users perform searches and retrieve records.
How do we get started?
Contact our Sales team to arrange an initial meeting. We will use this meeting to get to know your requirements and provide immediate feedback. If we do not think we can meet your needs, we will tell you up-front and recommend other options. If we both agree we are a good fit for your requirements, we recommend following our 5-Point Action Plan:
- Understand the different types, estimated quantity, and location of your existing records.
- Prioritize the records into groups and order based on anticipated benefit and ease of accessibility.
- Identity mandatory metadata requirements from your records and recommend optional metadata.
- Understand how you plan to deploy the solution.
- Validate Extract IQ processing against a sample of your records to make sure it meets the records retrieval requirements. Adjust, if required, and re-validate.
After following the action plan, you can make a go / no-go decision to move forward with us.
We look forward to hearing from you soon!