NYC Council must use this time to overhaul FOIL |
Ever since Mayor Adams took office, the City Council has done admirable work standing up to the mayor. It has overridden more mayoral vetoes than any Council in recent memory. It established its own Charter Commission to respond to the mayor’s. And it has held countless oversight hearings on the failures of the Adams administration. But what’s been missing from the Council’s efforts?
Any attempt to improve the city’s Freedom of Information Law.
If the Council does nothing, it will blow a historic opportunity. Councilmember Gale Brewer’s Intro 1235, which would require city agencies to report on how many FOIL requests they’re fulfilling, has been endorsed by major government watchdogs and media groups and is cosponsored by half the City Council. But despite wide support, the Council has sat on the bill since its hearing in June.
It’s obvious that NYC has a huge problem with transparency — Reinvent Albany’s report, NYC Government Flouting Freedom of Information Law, showed that NYC government failed to close 16% of FOIL requests within a year. Some agencies, such as the Department of Correction, took more than a year on average to respond to requests.
NYC........