IIB 

117TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION H. R. 2726 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

JUNE 16, 2021 

Received; read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary 

AN ACT 

To direct the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to establish a 

plan to reduce the backlog of requests for information 

made to the Department of Veterans Affairs pursuant 

to section 552 of title 5, United States Code, and for 

other purposes. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 


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1 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

2 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘VA FOIA Reform Act 

3 of 2021’’. 

4 SEC. 2. PLAN FOR REDUCTION OF BACKLOG OF FOIA RE5 QUESTS. 

6 (a) PLAN.—The Secretary of Veterans Affairs shall 

7 establish and carry out a plan for the Secretary to meet, 

8 by not later than five years after the date of the enactment 

9 of this Act, the requirements of section 552 of title 5, 

10 United States Code, with respect to providing documents 

11 and information under such section within the timeframes 

12 required by such section. The plan shall include the fol13 lowing: 

14 (1) Improving and acquiring technology, includ15 ing with respect to searching email and other elec16 tronic information, and the timelines for such im17 provement, to ensure that the information tech18 nology of the Department of Veterans Affairs is ca19 pable of carrying out the plan. 

20 (2) Identification of efficient procedures, poli21 cies, and systems of the Department that could be 

22 developed to allow employees of the Department re23 sponsible for replying to requests under such section 

24 552 to search and review documents rather than 

25 other employees of the Department. 


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1 (3) A schedule for carrying out the plan, includ2 ing key milestones and metrics. 

3 (b) COMPLIANCE ASSESSMENT.—The Secretary shall 

4 request the Director of the Office of Government Informa5 tion Services of the National Archives and Records Admin6 istration to conduct an assessment of the compliance by 

7 the Department of Veterans Affairs with section 552 of 

8 title 5, United States Code. 

9 (c) REPORTS.— 

10 (1) INITIAL REPORT.—Not later than 180 days 

11 after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Sec12 retary shall submit to the Committees on Veterans’ 

13 Affairs of the House of Representatives and the Sen14 ate a report on implementing subsections (a) and 

15 (b). The report shall include the following: 

16 (A) The plan established under subsection 

17 (a). 

18 (B) An analysis of the root causes of the 

19 backlog of FOIA requests. 

20 (C) Recommendations with respect to any 

21 additional resources or legislative action the 

22 Secretary determines necessary for such imple23 mentation. 

24 (2) ANNUAL REPORTS.—During the five-year 

25 period following the date of the enactment of this 


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1 Act, the Secretary shall submit to the Committees 

2 on Veterans’ Affairs of the House of Representatives 

3 and the Senate annual reports on— 

4 (A) carrying out the plan under subsection 

5 (a), including any updates or changes made to 

6 the plan; and 

7 (B) the compliance by the Department as 

8 described in subsection (b). 

9 (3) PUBLICATION.—The Secretary shall make 

10 publicly available on the internet website of the De11 partment the reports under paragraphs (1) and (2) 

12 by not later than 30 days after the date on which 

13 the Secretary submits the reports to the Committees 

14 on Veterans’ Affairs of the House of Representatives 

15 and the Senate. 

16 (d) BACKLOG OF FOIA REQUESTS DEFINED.—In 

17 this section, the term ‘‘backlog of FOIA requests’’ means 

18 the number of requests, as reported by the Secretary of 

19 Veterans Affairs to the Attorney General in the Annual 

20 FOIA Report, made by individuals to the Secretary pursu21 ant to section 552 of title 5, United States Code, for docu22 ments 


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1 or information that the Secretary has not fulfilled or pro2 vided a response to the individual. 

Passed the House of Representatives June 15, 2021. 

Attest: CHERYL L. JOHNSON, 

Clerk. 


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