As challenging as public records can be, it’s an incredibly important part of the democratic process that often provides a unique opportunity for oversight and engagement. That opportunity wouldn’t be possible without government officials doing their job, and often going above and beyond in the name of transparency.

This holiday, we once again want to ask you to take a moment and say thanks to a public records officer who has gone above and beyond in helping process a request. Maybe it was for waiving a fee, or helping you better phrase your request to get what you wanted.

Over the next two weeks, we’ll be taking submissions below, and then sharing and publicly thanking all those agencies that have gone above and beyond to help FOIA requesters. We’ll also be asking those agencies for tips on what they think can help make the public records request process work better for everyone.

We’ll also be browsing through the data from MuckRock’s “Thank an Agency” feature to highlight other helpful agencies, so if you haven’t used it before, now is a great opportunity.

So this Thanksgiving, to all FOIA and public records officers that help make the process work, we offer a sincere thank you for all your efforts.

Image via Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife