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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
(HHS)
150 DAYS TO RESPOND TO ARCHIVE; OUTSTANDING REQUESTS OVER
4 YEARS OLD
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Recordkeeping Issues - When contacted by the Archive
to determine the status of the FOIA request, HHS indicated
that it could not locate the request in its system. Accordingly,
the request was resubmitted on February 26, 2003. HHS advised
the Archive that locating its Ten Oldest FOIA Requests might
be difficult because their cataloguing system was incapable
of making such searches. |
Ten Oldest - HHS responded approximately 150 business
days after the request was submitted with ten FOIA requests
dated from December 30, 1998 to August 29, 2001. The cover
letter noted that several of the requests are for copies of
Office of Inspector General "fraud alerts" which
are available on the OIG Web site. Thus, HHS explained, they
may be answered even though they are still open in the FOIA
case log. The requests concern a list of the e-mail addresses
that receive the OIG news announcements, correspondence from
Congressman Tom Delay and Dennis Hastert between January 1,
1995 and October 1, 1998, copies of Medicare fraud alerts
and related materials concerning Medicare and Medicaid fraud
and abuse, records regarding the Review of Office of Community
Services' Discretionary Grants Awarded to Delta Foundation,
Inc. by the Office of Inspector General, correspondence regarding
Community Housing Services, Inc., New York State's plans regarding
the Adoption and Safe Families Act, compliance reports concerning
a Medicaid fraud settlement, lists of persons excluded from
participation in Medicaid and Medicare matters, reports from
the fraud investigation of the Minneapolis Indian Health Board.
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Workload Statistics - HHS's reported statistics from
1998 through 2002 indicate that the agency has received an
increasing number of FOIA requests, but the number jumped
most dramatically in the 2002 fiscal year; prior to 2002,
the number of FOIA requests ranged from a low of 58,401 to
a high of 65,954 (up 59.30% from 65,954 in 1998 to 105,068
in 2002). The number processed each year also has increased,
with a notable jump in the 2002 fiscal year (up 53.13% from
67,367 processed in 1998 to 103,163 processed in 2002). HHS's
processing rate per year -- a comparison of the number of
requests processed to the number received -- increased from
102.14% in 1998 to 98.19% in 2002. |
Backlog Statistics - HHS's backlog of pending FOIA
requests has increased (from 18,739 FOIA requests pending
at the end of 1998 to 19,308 FOIA requests pending at the
end of 2002). HHS's backlog as a percentage of FOIA requests
processed each year has increased from 8.19% in 1998 to 10.02%
in 2002. Its backlog rate per year -- a comparison of the
number of requests pending at the end of the year to the number
received during that year -- has decreased from 28.19% in
1998 to 18.38% in 2002. |
Processing Time - Under its multi-track system, HHS
reports median days to process ranging from 10-35 days for
simple requests, 60-332 days for complex requests, and 6-342
days for other requests over the 1998-2002 periods. Expedited
requests have processing times of 1-135 days with a range
of 15.5-27 reported for 2002. The median days that backlogged
requests have been pending is reported as 7-206 for 1998.
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TEN
OLDEST REQUESTS
HHS
Response Letter
HHS December
30, 1998 Letter
HHS May 3,
1999 Letter
HHS June 28,
1999 Letter
HHS August
10, 1999 Letter
HHS August
19, 1999 Letter
HHS April 4,
2001 Letter
HHS May 30,
2001 Letter
HHS July 11,
2001 Letter
HHS August
29, 2001 Letter
HHS May 30,
2001 Letter
HHS September
19, 2001 Letter
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