2020-10-14 Leadership Cadence

Date

14 Oct 2020

Participants

• Zach Goulson

• Josh Lintag

• Eddie Brown (Unlicensed)

• Will Beaumont

• Alec Akin (Unlicensed)

• Emily Crose

Goals

• Discuss FOIA and board membership logistics

Discussion topics

Topic	Presenter	Notes
FOIA		Primer questions: What do we do with FOIA? How do we want to approach Stonewalling What can we even do to compel valid responses from FOIA requests? Is there a way to source the information around which agencies fulfill/evade requests What are the gaps that we need information for that FOIA can fulfill? What does our attitude need to look like when we interface with the other end of these FOIA requests? FOIA is an activist endeavor - how far as a group should we take that at this moment in time? Comparing federal agencies vs non-federal FOIA requests Federal agencies Generally consistent regarding the kind of information that we get State and local Complete dismissal/non response for requests Invalid excuses on not being able to fulfill requests I.e. “non-existing” documentation for involvement/support of OPERATION LEGEND will require the generation of new documents to fulfill the request; law enforcement doesn’t “have to comply” because they cite that FOIA only applies to already existing documents Paywalled behind large pre-processing fees Requests for what should be readily available information (such as mission statements) are rejected in FOIA requests There’s value in the process of making FOIA requests, in addition to the content They hold law enforcement accountable Response/non-response can be tabulated as a data point Metropolitan police departments have not been reliable in fulfilling requests We can cross reference FOIA sourced data points with NIBRS/state-IBRS data points for inconsistencies Current state of PDAP support for FOIA For FOIA requests to take, there’s a need for legal representation that PDAP currently doesn’t have It’s been mentioned that we can seek this legal representation out if it’s not A&P We’ll have more pull once we’re incorporated and not simply a group Volunteer data opportunity - get someone to make requests and keep count of who fulfills/evades requests Identify what the expectations are for a request Document actual experience and how it differs from expectations Direction Current issues with Muckrock preventing us from socializing the FOIA requests to the rest of the group May require some follow up with Muckrock As we flesh out the NIBRS/OIBRS comparisons, we’ll have more information on what is missing and what we could potentially have FOIA fill in
Board		We’ll generally want folks that will be active participants and consistently around How do we make sure we stay diverse, and what does that look like for us? Leadership to DM Eddie for those interested Full Name Address
Splunk		Alec taking the lead on interfacing with reps from Splunk

Action items

• Zach GoulsonWill Beaumont Send Eddie a DM about board positions. Full name and address
• Making a FOIA request that is in line with what the FBI requests of local jurisdictions

Decisions