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POSTAL REGULATORY COMMISSION

Washington, DC 20268-0001

Office of the General Counsel

Chief FOIA Officer Report

Section 1: Steps Taken to Apply the Presumption of Openness

A. FOIA Leadership

1. The FOIA requires each agency to designate a Chief FOIA Officer who is a senior 

official at the Assistant Secretary or equivalent level. Is your agency’s Chief FOIA 

Officer at this level? 

The Commission’s Chief FOIA Officer is an Office Head within the Commission, reporting 

directly to the head of the agency.

2. Please provide the name and title of your agency’s Chief FOIA Officer.

David Trissell, General Counsel

B. FOIA Training

3. Did your FOIA professionals or the personnel at your agency who have FOIA 

responsibilities attend any substantive FOIA training or conference during the 

reporting period such as that provided by the Department of Justice?

Commission employees with new FOIA responsibilities were trained in-house by staff 

members of the Office of General Counsel with FOIA oversight responsibilities. 

4. If yes, please provide a brief description of the type of training attended or 

conducted and the topics covered.

Topics covered included how to process a request (administratively), how to log requests, 

how to prepare responses, and how to monitor the FOIA email mailbox at the 

Commission. 

5. Provide an estimate of the percentage of your FOIA professionals and staff with 

FOIA responsibilities who attended substantive FOIA training during this reporting 

period.

All Commission FOIA professionals either attended or provided FOIA training during the 

reporting period.
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6. OIP has directed agencies to “take steps to ensure that all of their FOIA 

professionals attend substantive FOIA training at least once throughout the year.” If 

your response to the previous question is that less than 80% of your FOIA 

professionals attended training, please explain your agency’s plan to ensure that all 

FOIA professionals receive or attend substantive FOIA training during the next 

reporting year.

As time and budget allows, the Commission plans to offer FOIA training to all FOIA 

professionals, with an emphasis on those who have new responsibilities or have not yet 

attended training.

C. Outreach

7. Did your FOIA professionals engage in any outreach or dialogue with the requester 

community or open government groups regarding your administration of the 

FOIA? Please describe any such outreach or dialogue, and, if applicable, any specific 

examples of how this dialogue has led to improvements in your agency’s FOIA 

administration.

N/A

D. Other Initiatives

8. Describe any efforts your agency has undertaken to inform non-FOIA professionals 

of their obligations under the FOIA.

Non-FOIA professionals within the agency are reminded of their obligations under the 

Commission’s records policy during annual training.

9. Optional -- If there are any other initiatives undertaken by your agency to ensure 

that the presumption of openness is being applied, please describe them here.

N/A
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Section II: Steps Taken to Ensure that Your Agency Has an Effective System 

in Place for Responding to Requests

DOJ’s FOIA Guidelines emphasize that “[a]pplication of the proper disclosure standard is only one part 

of ensuring transparency. Open government requires not just a presumption of disclosure, but also an 

effective system for responding to FOIA requests.” It is essential that agencies effectively manage their 

FOIA program.

Please answer the following questions to describe the steps your agency has taken to ensure that the 

management of your FOIA program is effective and efficient. You should also include any additional 

information that that describes your agency's efforts in this area.

1. For Fiscal Year 2019, what was the average number of days your agency reported 

for adjudicating requests for expedited processing? Please see Section VIII.A. of 

your agency's Fiscal Year 2019 Annual FOIA Report.

18 days.

2. If your agency's average number of days to adjudicate requests for expedited 

processing was above ten calendar days, please describe the steps your agency will 

take to ensure that requests for expedited processing are adjudicated within ten 

calendar days or less.

The Commission had exactly one request for expedited processing in FY 2019. The 

Commission did not track adjudication of the expedited processing request separately 

from the underlying request, but responded substantively to the request in 18 calendar 

days, granting it in full. In the future the Commission will endeavor to notify the 

requester of its action with regard to expedition requests.

3. During the reporting period, did your agency conduct a self-assessment of its FOIA 

program? If so, please describe the methods used, such as reviewing Annual Report 

data, using active workflows and track management, reviewing and updating 

processing procedures, etc.

N/A

4. The FOIA Improvement Act of 2016 requires additional notification to requesters 

about the services provided by the agency’s FOIA Public Liaison. Please provide an 

estimate of the number of times requesters sought assistance from your agency’s 

FOIA Public Liaison during FY 2019 (please provide a total number or an estimate 

of the number).

No requesters reached out to the Commission’s FOIA Public Liaison during FY 2019.
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5. Optional -- Please describe:

• Best practices used to ensure that your FOIA system operates efficiently and 

effectively

• Any challenges your agency faces in this area

The Commission recently moved responsibility for FOIA from its Office of Secretary and 

Administration to its Office of General Counsel to ensure consistent legal involvement 

and oversight of all FOIA requests and processes. 
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Section III: Steps Taken to Increase Proactive Disclosures

The Department of Justice has long focused on the need for agencies to work proactively to post 

information online without waiting for individual requests to be received.

Please answer the following questions to describe the steps your agency has taken to increase the 

amount of material that is available on your agency websites. In addition to the questions below, you 

should also describe any additional steps taken by your agency to make and improve proactive 

disclosures of information.

1. Provide examples of any material that your agency has proactively disclosed during 

the past reporting year, including records that have been requested and released 

three or more times in accordance with 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(2)(D). Please include links 

to these materials as well.

The Commission proactively publishes to its docket system all comments and filings in 

any docketed proceeding before the Commission. See 

https://www.prc.gov/dockets/active. The Commission also publishes electronic versions 

of its reports and reports filed by the Postal Service with the Commission. See

https://www.prc.gov/reports. The Commission did not have any records requested three 

or more times during the reporting period. 

2. Beyond posting new material, is your agency taking steps to make the posted 

information more useful to the public, especially to the community of individuals 

who regularly access your agency’s website?

The Commission is engaged in an ongoing effort to upgrade its docketing system, and in 

the last two years upgraded its public-facing website to better serve the users who 

regularly access the Commission’s website.

3. If yes, please provide examples of such improvements.

Please see response to item 2 above.

4. Optional -- Please describe:

• Best practices used to improve proactive disclosures

• Any challenges your agency faces in this area

Please see responses to items 1 and 2 above.
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Section IV: Steps Taken to Greater Utilize Technology

A key component of FOIA administration is using technology to make information more accessible. In 

addition to using the internet to make proactive disclosures, agencies should also be exploring ways to 

utilize technology in responding to requests.

Please answer the following questions to describe how your agency is utilizing technology to improve its 

FOIA administration and the public's access to information. You should also include any additional 

information that that describes your agency's efforts in this area.

1. Is your agency leveraging or exploring any new technology to facilitate efficiency in 

its FOIA administration that you have not previously reported? If so, please 

describe the type of technology. 

N/A

2. OIP issued guidance in 2017 encouraging agencies to regularly review their FOIA 

websites to ensure that they contain essential resources, and are informative and 

user-friendly. Has your agency reviewed its FOIA website(s) during the reporting 

period to ensure it addresses the elements noted in the guidance?

When updating its website prior to the reporting period, the Commission reviewed it to 

ensure it contained the resources, to the extent they exist at the Commission, are present 

on the Commission FOIA website. During the reporting period the Commission has kept 

those resources up to date. See https://www.prc.gov/foia.

3. Did your agency successfully post all four quarterly reports for Fiscal Year 2019?

Yes, Commission quarterly reports were all successfully posted. See 

https://www.prc.gov/foia/foia-quarterly-reports.

4. If your agency did not successfully post all quarterly reports, with information 

appearing on FOIA.gov, please explain why and provide your agency’s plan for 

ensuring that such reporting is successful in Fiscal Year 2020.

N/A

5. The FOIA Improvement Act of 2016 requires all agencies to post the raw statistical 

data used to compile their Annual FOIA Reports. Please provide the link to this 

posting for your agency’s Fiscal Year 2018 Annual FOIA Report and, if available, 

for your agency’s Fiscal Year 2019 Annual FOIA Report.

The Commission posts the XML and CSV formats, containing all the raw data for its 

Annual FOIA Reports to its FOIA website. See 

https://www.prc.gov/sites/default/files/foia/PRC%20FY19%20Final.xml (FY 2019),

https://www.prc.gov/sites/default/files/foia/prc_fy2019_raw_data_csv.csv (FY2019),

https://www.prc.gov/sites/default/files/foia/PRC%202018%20FINAL.xml (FY 2018),

https://www.prc.gov/sites/default/files/foia/prc_fy2018_raw_data_csv.csv (FY 2018).
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.

6. Optional -- Please describe:

• Best practices used in greater utilizing technology

• Any challenges your agency faces in this area

The Commission receives a small number of substantive FOIA requests each year. For 

example, during FY 2019 the Commission received 15 requests, but over half these 

requests were for records the Commission does not create or house. Of the remaining 

requests, the Commission endeavors to respond to each as quickly as practicable (only 

one request in FY 2019 took 20 days to process). The Commission, due to its size and 

employee responsibilities in mission-critical areas and relatively small number of FOIA 

requests, faces challenges in producing reports geared for much larger agencies with 

greater challenges and backlogs. 
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Section V: Steps Taken to Improve Timeliness in Responding to Requests 

and Reducing Backlogs

The Department of Justice has emphasized the importance of improving timeliness in responding to 

requests. This section of your Chief FOIA Officer Report addresses both time limits and backlog 

reduction. Backlog reduction is measured both in terms of numbers of backlogged requests or appeals 

and by looking at whether agencies closed their ten oldest requests, appeals, and consultations.

For the figures required in this Section, please use the numbers contained in the specified sections of 

your agency’s 2019 Annual FOIA Report and, when applicable, your agency’s 2018 Annual FOIA 

Report.

A. Simple Track

Section VII.A of your agency’s Annual FOIA Report, entitled "FOIA Requests – Response Time for All 

Processed Requests," includes figures that show your agency's average response times for processed 

requests. For agencies utilizing a multi-track system to process requests, there is a category for "simple" 

requests, which are those requests that are placed in the agency’s fastest (non-expedited) track, based on 

the low volume and/or simplicity of the records requested.

1. Does your agency utilize a separate track for simple requests?

Yes. 

2. If your agency uses a separate track for simple requests, was the agency overall 

average number of days to process simple requests twenty working days or fewer in 

Fiscal Year 2019?

Yes – 10 days average.

3. Please provide the percentage of requests processed by your agency in Fiscal Year 

2019 that were placed in your simple track.

93 percent.

4. If your agency does not track simple requests separately, was the average number 

of days to process all non-expedited requests twenty working days or fewer?

N/A
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B. Backlogs

Section XII.A of your agency’s Annual FOIA Report, entitled "Backlogs of FOIA Requests and 

Administrative Appeals" shows the numbers of any backlogged requests or appeals from the fiscal year. 

You should refer to these numbers from your Annual FOIA Reports for both Fiscal Year 2018 and Fiscal 

Year 2019 when completing this section of your Chief FOIA Officer Report.

BACKLOGGED REQUESTS

5. If your agency had a backlog of requests at the close of Fiscal Year 2019, did that 

backlog decrease as compared with the backlog reported at the end of Fiscal Year 

2018?

N/A

6. If not, did your agency process more requests during Fiscal Year 2019 than it did 

during Fiscal Year 2018?

N/A

7. If your agency’s request backlog increased during Fiscal Year 2019, please explain 

why and describe the causes that contributed to your agency not being able to 

reduce its backlog. When doing so, please also indicate if any of the following were 

contributing factors:

• An increase in the number of incoming requests.

• A loss of staff.

• An increase in the complexity of the requests received. If possible, please 

provide examples or briefly describe the types of complex requests 

contributing to your backlog increase.

• Any other reasons – please briefly describe or provide examples when 

possible.

N/A

8. If you had a request backlog please report the percentage of requests that make up 

the backlog out of the total number of requests received by your agency in Fiscal 

Year 2019. If your agency has no request backlog, please answer with “N/A.”

BACKLOGGED APPEALS

9. If your agency had a backlog of appeals at the close of Fiscal Year 2019, did that 

backlog decrease as compared with the backlog reported at the end of Fiscal Year 

2018?

N/A – no backlog.
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10. If not, did your agency process more appeals during Fiscal Year 2019 than it did 

during Fiscal Year 2018?

N/A – no backlog.

11. If your agency’s appeal backlog increased during Fiscal Year 2019, please explain 

why and describe the causes that contributed to your agency not being able to 

reduce its backlog. When doing so, please also indicate if any of the following were 

contributing factors:

• An increase in the number of incoming appeals.

• A loss of staff.

• An increase in the complexity of the requests received. If possible, please 

provide examples or briefly describe the types of complex requests 

contributing to your backlog increase.

• Any other reasons – please briefly describe or provide examples when 

possible.

N/A – no backlog.

12. If you had an appeal backlog please report the percentage of appeals that make up 

the backlog out of the total number of appeals received by your agency in Fiscal 

Year 2019. If your agency did not receive any appeals in Fiscal Year 2019 and/or 

has no appeal backlog, please answer with "N/A."

N/A – no backlog.

C. Backlog Reduction Plans

13. In the 2019 guidelines for Chief FOIA Officer Reports, any agency with a backlog of 

over 1000 requests in Fiscal Year 2018 was asked to provide a plan for achieving 

backlog reduction in the year ahead. Did you agency implement a backlog 

reduction plan last year? If so, describe your agency’s efforts in implementing this 

plan and note if your agency was able to achieve backlog reduction in Fiscal Year 

2019?

N/A – no backlog.

14. If your agency had a backlog of more than 1,000 requests in Fiscal Year 2019, what 

is your agency’s plan to reduce this backlog during Fiscal Year 2020?

N/A – no backlog.
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D. Status of Oldest Requests, Appeals, and Consultations

Section VII.E, entitled "Pending Requests – Ten Oldest Pending Requests," Section VI.C.(5), entitled "Ten 

Oldest Pending Administrative Appeals," and Section XII.C., entitled "Consultations on FOIA Requests –

Ten Oldest Consultations Received from Other Agencies and Pending at Your Agency," show the ten 

oldest pending requests, appeals, and consultations. You should refer to these numbers from your 

Annual FOIA Reports for both Fiscal Year 2018 and Fiscal Year 2019 when completing this section of 

your Chief FOIA Officer Report.

OLDEST REQUESTS

15. In Fiscal Year 2019, did your agency close the ten oldest requests that were reported 

pending in your Fiscal Year 2018 Annual FOIA Report?

N/A – no backlog.

16. If no, please provide the number of these requests your agency was able to close by 

the end of the fiscal year, as listed in Section VII.E of your Fiscal Year 2018 Annual 

FOIA Report. If you had fewer than ten total oldest requests to close, please indicate 

that.

N/A – no backlog.

17. Beyond work on the ten oldest requests, please describe any steps your agency took 

to reduce the overall age of your pending requests.

N/A – no backlog.

TEN OLDEST APPEALS

18. In Fiscal Year 2019, did your agency close the ten oldest appeals that were reported 

pending in your Fiscal Year 2018 Annual FOIA Report?

N/A – no backlog.

19. If no, please provide the number of these appeals your agency was able to close by 

the end of the fiscal year, as listed in Section VII.C.(5) of your Fiscal Year 2018 

Annual FOIA Report. If you had fewer than ten total oldest appeals to close, please 

indicate that.

N/A – no backlog.

20. Beyond work on the ten oldest appeals, please describe any steps your agency took 

to reduce the overall age of your pending appeals.

N/A – no backlog.
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TEN OLDEST CONSULTATIONS

21. In Fiscal Year 2019, did your agency close the ten oldest consultations that were 

reported pending in your Fiscal Year 2018 Annual FOIA Report?

N/A – no backlog.

22. If no, please provide the number of these consultations your agency was able to 

close by the end of the fiscal year, as listed in Section XII.C. of your Fiscal Year 2018 

Annual FOIA Report. If you had fewer than ten total oldest consultations to close, 

please indicate that.

N/A – no backlog.

E. Additional Information on Ten Oldest Requests, Appeals, and 

Consultations & Plans

23. Briefly explain any obstacles your agency faced in closing its ten oldest requests, 

appeals, and consultations from Fiscal Year 2019.

N/A – no backlog.

24. If your agency was unable to close any of its ten oldest requests because you were 

waiting to hear back from other agencies on consultations you sent, please provide 

the date the request was initially received by your agency, the date when your 

agency sent the consultation, and the date when you last contacted the agency 

where the consultation was pending.

N/A – no backlog.

25. If your agency did not close its ten oldest pending requests, appeals, or 

consultations, please provide a plan describing how your agency intends to close 

those “ten oldest” requests, appeals, and consultations during Fiscal Year 2020.

N/A – no backlog.

F. Success Stories

Out of all the activities undertaken by your agency since March 2019 to increase transparency and 

improve FOIA administration, please briefly describe here at least one success story that you would like 

to highlight as emblematic of your agency’s efforts. The success story can come from any one of the five 

key areas. As noted above, OIP will highlight these agency success stories during Sunshine Week. To 

facilitate this process, all agencies should use bullets to describe their success story and limit their text to 

a half page. The success story is designed to be a quick summary of key achievements. A complete 

description of all your efforts will be contained in the body of your Chief FOIA Officer Report.

During the reporting period the Commission transferred responsibility for FOIA to its 

Office of General Counsel (previously housed within the Office of Secretary and 

Administration). This change was made to ensure that each requests has immediate legal 

attention and potential issues with regard to production, scope, or exemptions are 

identified early.