Policy documents

To Whom It May Concern:

Pursuant to the Pennsylvania Right to Know Act, I hereby request the following records:

Any policy manual, employee procedure manual, or folder of collected policies which guide police operations. This may be one document with many policies, or all policies collected.

The original format of the documents is acceptable (PDF, .doc, .txt, etc).

The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes.

In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 5 business days, as the statute requires.

Sincerely,

Josh Chamberlain

Dear Mr. Goodrich,

I appreciate your reply. Rather than making an appeal, I will address your reasons for denial in order to clarify the request:

1. As you say, "Allegheny County Sheriff’s Office utilizes a large array of policies that guide its operations..." These are the policies which are being sought—those which guide police operations. For example, the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police publishes a "manual of procedural orders", which presumably does not contain information that would be excepted from disclosure under right-to-know law. https://pittsburghpa.gov/police/manual-procedural-orders

2. The intention of requesting records from the Allegheny County Sheriff's Office was to obtain records in custody the Allegheny County Sheriff's Office, and not from other agencies. I will be sure to adjust the language of future requests.

3. Certainly, I do not wish to endanger the Office's computer security or ongoing investigations. I believe the Office is well within its rights to redact or omit records which are excepted from disclosure. Please proceed with the request by supplying those policies which are not excepted.

Thank you,
Josh Chamberlain