FOIA Appeal: 20 Year Old Files on Foreclosured Projects

Legal Opinion: GMP-0063

Index: 7.340, 7.350, 7.360, 7.430

Subject: FOIA Appeal: 20 Year Old Files on Foreclosured Projects

March 25, 1992

Mr. Robert L. Elliott

923 East 221st Street, PH-B

Bronx, New York 10469-1014

Dear Mr. Elliott:

We are in receipt of your original Freedom of Information

Act requests and subsequent FOIA appeal from 1988. We also

received the related background materials which you submitted on

December 4, 1991. As indicated in your December 3, 1991

telephone conversation with Carol Bernstein, staff attorney in

the Personnel and Ethics Law Division, since the correspondence

files for Triangle H.D.F. Corporation and Chambers H.D.F.

Corporation had been stored on microfiche and retired to the

Government Archives, it was necessary to recall this information

before responding to your requests.

Background

On May 16, 1988 you requested information from the Office of

the Assistant Secretary for Housing regarding the merger of

Triangle Corporation and Chambers Corporation into the Chamtri

Corporation. You also requested the qualification guidelines for

participation in HUD programs by principals who were in default

and the Financial Disclosure Statements for the Chamtri Corp.

You submitted a separate FOIA request, dated May 16, 1988, to the

Department\'s New York Regional Office. Items in that request

included:

1\. HUD Form 92266, transfer of physical assets application

2\. Replacement Reserve Fund request

3\. Closing file on each of the two entities that were

merged into Chamtri

4\. Transferee\'s questionnaire

5\. All New York State records relating to the two

corporations that were merged into Chamtri

On May 17, 1988, you forwarded an addendum to your May 16

request to the New York Regional Office. Your addendum requested

the Regional Office of Inspector General\'s disposition files

regarding the Triangle Apartments Project No. 012-44062 and

Chambers Housing Project No. 012-44155 . This information was

referenced in material you sent us regarding a memorandum to

Kenneth Stroud, former Regional Inspector General for

Investigations, dated April 1, 1983. You also requested a

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computer print-out of Section 8 authorizations for the Triangle

and Chambers Housing Development Fund Corporations from January

1980 through December 1983.

According to our records, your May 16, 1988 letter to

the Office of Housing was responded to on June 1, 1988 by

Susan Zagame, former Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy,

Financial Management and Administration in the Office of Housing.

Ms. Zagame\'s response included the release of several Previous

Participation Certificates executed by the principals of the

Triangle and Chambers Corporations. She also explained the

criteria which the Department used regarding participation in HUD

programs by principals whose projects were in default. Finally,

she advised that you contact the New York Regional Office

regarding your request for the Financial Disclosure Statements.

On July 15, 1988, Francine Kellman, Special Assistant to the

Regional Administrator in the New York Office, provided a

response to your May 16 and 17, 1988 FOIA requests. This

response denied your requests because the documents contained

confidential, commercial and financial business information

which was protected from disclosure under Exemption 4. On

July 18, 1988, you appealed the New York Regional Office\'s

denial of your requests. In a letter to Secretary Kemp, dated

November 18, 1991, you indicated that you had not received a

response to your FOIA appeal. Ms. Bernstein subsequently

contacted you on December 3, 1991.

Determination

In response to your appeal, we have reviewed the files

dating back to 1967 which were obtained from the Government

Archives. Based on this review, I have determined to release the

information we have available. Specifically, I have determined

to reverse the initial denial with respect to item 3 of your

request and release 637 documents. Copies of this information

are enclosed. In regard to your request for \"closing files\" on

the foreclosed projects, please note that the Department does not

maintain \"closing files.\" However, I am releasing information

from our correspondence files relating to the operations, default

and foreclosure sales for the Triangle and Chambers Corporations.

Much of this material was previously denied under Exemption 4.

Although some of this material contains commercial and

financial information protected from disclosure under

Exemption 4, I have determined that disclosure would not cause

substantial harm to the competitive position of either the

Triangle or Chambers Corporation since many of the records are

more than twenty years old and the related projects have been

foreclosed. Likewise, with respect to the intra-office memoranda

and notes enclosed, I have concluded that disclosure would not

harm the Agency\'s deliberative process under Exemption 5. We

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also redacted the Social Security numbers and names of tenants

and apartment staff employees from eleven (11) of these

documents. This information is protected under the FOIA\'s

Exemption 6 regarding personal privacy information. I have also

determined pursuant to 24 C.F.R. 15.21 that the public interest

in protecting personal privacy militates against release of this

information.

We have no further information in our files which responds

to items 1, 2, 4, and 5 of your FOIA requests. We were also

unable to locate a computer print-out of Section 8 authorizations

pertaining to the Triangle and Chambers projects from 1980-1983.

Pursuant to 24 C.F.R. Part 2002, your FOIA request for the

Triangle Apartments and Chamber Housing disposition report files

should be submitted to G. L. Isdell, New York Regional Office of

Inspector General, 26 Federal Plaza, New York, New York 10278-

0068\.

Again, we apologize for our inordinate delay in responding

to your initial request for an appeal determination. However, as

previously indicated in our correspondence of November 21 and

December 6, 1991, your request was inadvertently misplaced in the

Headquarters Office.

Appeal Rights

You have the right to judicial review of this determination

under 5 U.S.C. 552(a)(4).

Very sincerely yours,

C. H. Albright, Jr.

Principal Deputy General Counsel

Enclosures