Watchdogs to State’s Committee on Open Government: Endorse FOIL Bills Already Backed by Legislators and Public

October 20, 2026

NYS Committee on Open Government

Re: Legislative Recommendations for the 2026 COOG Annual Report

Dear Members and Staff of the Committee on Open Government,

We write to provide legislative recommendations for the Committee on Open Government’s (COOG) 2026 annual report. We urge COOG to support the following bills strengthening New York’s Freedom of Information Law (FOIL), which are widely supported by New York and national transparency advocates:

1. Require electronic FOIL appeals (S9607 (May) / A11143 (Kassay)): Access to public records should not depend on a requester’s ability to navigate outdated paper procedures, and requiring electronic appeals would eliminate unnecessary barriers, modernize FOIL, and make public records more accessible to all New Yorkers. COOG’s current report draft does not include this legislation, which is supported by 13 groups.

2. Limit commercial FOIL exemption (S9777 (Sepúlveda) / A1410 (Rosenthal)): Requiring companies to identify specific portions of records to be exempt and to re-apply for a commercial exemption will prevent private companies from using indefinite exemptions to shield publicly held records from scrutiny. This bill is supported by 14 groups.

3. Report FOIL activity (S9739 (Kavanagh) / A2321 (McDonald)): The public cannot hold agencies accountable on FOIL without knowing whether they are complying with the law, and systematic reporting is essential to expose delays, identify failures, measure compliance, and ensure FOIL works in practice. This bill is supported by 14 groups.

4. Strengthen FOIL attorneys’ fees (S1418-A (Liu) / A950-A (Steck)): Removing the restrictive requirement that requesters “substantially prevail” to recover attorneys’ fees in FOIL lawsuits will bring New York in line with other states and make it easier for members of the public to challenge unlawful denials. This bill is supported by 14 groups.

5. Reduce agency FOIL response time (S10098 (Skoufis) / A10759 (Raga)): FOIL loses its value when agencies delay disclosure for months or years, and meaningful deadlines are necessary to prevent delays from undermining the public’s right to know and to ensure individuals can seek timely relief when agencies fail to comply. This bill is supported by 14 groups.

We urge COOG to support these bills in its 2026 annual report as essential reforms to strengthen FOIL and uphold the public’s right to know. Across the state, delayed responses, overly broad exemptions, limited accountability, and outdated administrative requirements continue to impede access to public records and undermine government transparency. These bills address longstanding barriers to disclosure, promote greater agency accountability, and ensure that FOIL serves its fundamental purpose: enabling New Yorkers to meaningfully scrutinize government actions, spending, and decision-making.

More detailed comments on the legislation are provided below:

Require electronic FOIL appeals (S9607 (May) / A11143 (Kassay))
COOG’s draft report does not contain a position on S9607 (May) / A11143 (Kassay), which would require agencies to allow submission of appeals electronically. We believe COOG should include a statement of support for this bill in its annual report. Our groups strongly support this bill because it is absurd that in 2026, agencies may still require FOIL appeals to be done via snail mail. While New York State requires that all agencies allow FOIL requests to be filed electronically, a loophole in state law makes it so that agencies may require appeals to be done by mail, creating an onerous and wasteful roadblock to public access to records.

Most state agencies have transitioned to software that can enable appeals to be submitted electronically through a website. Indeed, the state’s contract with the vendor, GovQA, actually requires this functionality, and state agencies only need to enable this feature. Agencies that are not using FOIL software could use email to satisfy this common-sense requirement. Thus, requiring electronic appeals, either through email or a website, will place no additional burden on agencies and simplify the appeals process for the public.

Limit commercial FOIL exemption (S9777 (Sepúlveda) / A1410 (Rosenthal))
This legislation would remove the ability for companies to seek permanent commercial exemptions to FOIL, instead requiring them to identify which portions of records should be exempt and periodically reapply for the exemption. Our groups support this bill because businesses, vendors, and other third parties should not be able to permanently exempt records submitted to the government from disclosure. Currently, when submitting records to a government agency in New York, a business can apply for a blanket, indefinite exemption for disclosure of those records. In other words, the business can keep what should be public records from ever being released via a FOIL request.

We believe that placing limits on businesses and vendors’ ability to exempt these records is crucial for improving transparency in New York State. New Yorkers should be able to see how much their state government is paying for goods and services. Removing the permanent exemption will ensure greater public access to information about government spending and the costs of services from private contractors.

Report FOIL activity (S9739 (Kavanagh) / A2321 (McDonald))
Our groups support this legislation because we believe it will help the public and government better understand how FOIL is working in New York and what steps are necessary to improve it. It is impossible to assess the state of NYS FOIL because agencies are not required to publicly report basic information about how they deal with the FOIL requests they are receiving.

This bill requires agencies to annually report FOIL data, such as when each request was received, how it was resolved, and more, to the Committee on Open Government. Publishing this data will show legislators and the public which agencies are complying with FOIL and which are shirking it. Access to this data is essential to keep the implementation of our state’s core transparency law transparent. If our systems of transparency are themselves opaque, they are unlikely to be effective.

Strengthen FOIL attorneys’ fees (S1418-A (Liu) / A950-A (Steck))
We urge COOG to support S1418-A (Liu) / A950-A (Steck). Our groups support this bill because we believe it will bring greater transparency to NYS government. In 2017, NYS passed the FOIL attorneys’ fees law, which made it so that state agencies must reimburse records requestors who “substantially prevail” in their lawsuit. The law was a big step forward for transparency, but the requirement that requestors “substantially” prevail is burdensome and overly broad compared to other jurisdictions. At least 11 other states, including California, Illinois, Michigan, and New Jersey, require that requestors simply “prevail” in FOIL cases. Passing this legislation will remove the word “substantially” and bring New York’s transparency laws up to par with other states.

Reduce agency FOIL response time (S10098 (Skoufis) / A10759 (Raga))
COOG has indicated that it does not support a “one size fits all” approach to statutory deadlines for responses to FOIL requests. We urge COOG to reconsider this position, as this legislation will foster a more transparent state government by reducing the time the public must wait before appealing the delay or denial of FOIL requests.

We believe New York government agencies are severely undermining the Freedom of Information Law by routinely failing to provide records for months or even years. Regardless of agency motives, our experience is that agencies regularly delay the FOIL process far past the statutory requirement.

FOIL is broken in New York State. While the absence of FOIL reporting makes it difficult to see how long agencies take to respond to FOIL requests on average, the available data and anecdotes from the public suggest that many FOIL requests are not completed, and agency delays can make the process drag out interminably.

This bill provides that requests are deemed constructively denied if the agency does not respond in a timely manner, which will incentivize agencies to acknowledge and complete requests more quickly, as well as enable requesters to sue for records more quickly when agencies do not comply with the law. The phase-in of a sixty-day deadline also ensures that requests are not subject to endless delays.

We urge COOG to support the above legislative proposals. Their adoption would maximize public access to records and bring New York closer to its stated commitment to transparency and open government.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Rachael Fauss
Senior Policy Advisor, Reinvent Albany

Adam Rose
Deputy Director of Advocacy, Freedom of the Press Foundation

Jerome D. Greco
Digital Forensics Director, The Legal Aid Society

Zachary Ahmad
Senior Policy Counsel, New York Civil Liberties Union

Michelle Allen
President, New York Coalition for Open Government

Alec Ferretti
Reclaim the Records

Corinne Worthington
Advocacy & Community Engagement Manager, Surveillance Technology Oversight Project

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