Public Records Request Log - Texas Workforce Commission
It is a clone of this request.
| Tracking # |
150922-005 |
| Submitted | Sept. 21, 2015 |
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Communications
From: Erik Peterson
To Whom It May Concern:
Pursuant to the Texas Public Information Act, I hereby request the following records:
A log of public records requests submitted to the Workforce Commission that lists the date of request, the requester's name, the requester's organizational affiliation, a description of the request and the date the request was filled. Ideally I would like this information for the period from 2004 to the present.
The requested documents will be made available to the general public free of charge as part of the public information service at MuckRock.com, and is made in the process of academic research and not for commercial usage.
In the event that fees cannot be waived, 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.
Sincerely,
Erik Peterson
PhD Candidate
Department of Political Science
Stanford University
From: MuckRock.com
To Whom It May Concern:
I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information request, copied below, and originally submitted on Sept. 21, 2015. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response, or if further clarification is needed.
Thanks for your help, and let me know if further clarification is needed.
From: Chastain, Lona
The request would require a manual search and review of all requests to see if they are releasable.
TWC’s records retention on requests is two years.
The vast majority of the records requests relate to the administration of unemployment compensation and employer taxes which are confidential under 20 CFR Part 603 and Texas Labor Code Section 301.081-301.085.
TWC is prohibited by law from releasing the names of individuals receiving unemployment compensation and the names of employers from the employer tax system maintained by TWC.
TWC is not able to segregate the confidential names from the releasable names without a manual search of each request.
Attached is the cost estimate relating to your request.
A hard copy of the attached response is being mailed to you today under separate cover.
/lc
Lona Chastain
Texas Workforce Commission
Assistant General Counsel/Privacy Advisor
512/463-2238
From: Texas Workforce Commission
A letter stating the requester must agree to or prepay assessed or estimated fees in order for the agency to continue processing the request.
From: Erik Peterson
Thank you for your response. I won't be able to afford those costs, but I wanted to check and see if there are any less costly options for getting some information about the number of requests the TWC has received, particularly requests that originated from media outlets.
1) Would it be possible to not release the names or nature of the requests the TWC has received and instead provide a count of the number of requests the TWC has received each month over the past 2 years?
2) Would it be possible to release information only about the requests the TWC has received from media organizations in Texas (e.g., newspapers, TV stations), rather than individuals asking about unemployment compensation, for each month over the past 2 years?
I'm not sure the extent to which either of these things would be feasible given your system or would reduce the costs from those you've cited above, but I just wanted to check. If there's some other way I'm not thinking of that would lower the costs and make releasing this type of information simpler please let me know.
Thank you for your time,
Erik
From: Chastain, Lona
Regarding Item 1: The numbers are required to be reported to the Office of the Attorney General Monthly so we will have those reports.
Regarding Item 2: We do not flag media requests to differentiate them from other requests.
/lv
Lona Chastain
Texas Workforce Commission
Assistant General Counsel/Privacy Advisor
512/463-2238
From: Erik Peterson
Ok, in that case I'd like to limit my request to just the aggregate monthly numbers that you've provided to the Attorney General over the last 2 years.
Thank you,
Erik
From: Chastain, Lona
Attached please find the response to your request.
Thank you.
Open Records
Texas Workforce Commission
101 E. 15th Street, Room 266
Austin, TX 78778-0001
Tel: 512-463-2422
Fax: 512-463-2990
open.records@twc.state.tx.us<mailto:open.records@twc.state.tx.us>
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