Hamilton is supposed to complete information requests within 30 days — The Spec's been waiting a year

It was a tale of two COVID-19 outbreaks.

One involved a Hamilton basketball team and the other a downtown highrise apartment.

The Spectator has reported on both, but attempts for more details through freedom-of-information (FOI) requests have dragged on for nearly a year - even though requests are supposed to be completed within 30 days.

It shouldn't be this hard - or take this long - to get public records, says Arthur Schafer, founding director of the Centre for Professional and Applied Ethics at the University of Manitoba.

And it's incumbent on city officials to address whatever issues are causing the delays.

Information delayed is information denied," Schafer said.

That's not what the city wants, says a councillor who has pushed for more readily available public records through an access-by-design" approach.

In a democratic system, you need to be able to respond quickly to FOI requests or requests for records as quickly as possible," Coun. Brad Clark said.

Nonetheless, on the basketball and highrise outbreaks, the ongoing transparency initiative doesn't appear to have helped.

In April 2021, The Spectator filed an FOI request asking for correspondence between city staff over a two-week period that same month relating to why public health was adamant the name of an elite private basketball team's name be kept secret (even though it had already been released via an earlier FOI request).

The city quoted the newspaper a $1,000 fee to access the records, saying more than 2,200 records were responsive. We paid a deposit of $500, but nearly a year later, the city won't hand over the records.

A similar situation is unfolding with another file.

Last May, The Spectator wanted to know more about a growing COVID outbreak at the Rebecca Towers apartment building.

Residents were pleading with the city to offer a vaccine clinic in the 17-storey building saying public health failed to inform them about the outbreak. Residents were desperate. Help us" read a sign one resident hung from their balcony.

The Spectator filed an FOI request that month, asking for correspondence between city staff, councillors, public health officials and others relating to the Rebecca Towers outbreak. The city quoted us a $350 fee. We paid the $175 deposit.

But again, nearly a year later, still no records.

The city clerk's office, which processes FOI requests, has provided estimated timelines for the files, but the timelines are routinely pushed back.

Each have a large volume of responsive records," said Lisa Barroso, the city's manager of corporate records and freedom of information, in a Feb. 28 email, explaining yet another delay.

In the same email, Barroso said there is no longer an estimated timeline for completion for Rebecca Towers.

As for the basketball FOI, it could be completed by late April."

The Spectator has filed appeals with the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario regarding both delays.

Clark said he couldn't speculate on what's gumming up the two requests without knowing the details, but suggested queries yielding many emails between officials over an extended period can be onerous.

Without doing a deep dive, I know from experience that these FOI requests can reveal hundreds, it not almost a thousand or more records."

In 2020, Hamilton fielded 195 FOI requests, which was the eighth-highest total among 274 municipal corporations in Ontario, according to the privacy commissioner's annual report.

Of those, staff completed" 168 requests, which means they provided the records or sent a letter denying access; 136 requests, or 81 per cent, were processed with the 30-day requirement under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act.

Here's how Hamilton's 30-day compliance rate compared with a few other municipalities:

• Toronto, which received the most requests at 2,036, completed 1,867 and got 700, or 37.5 per cent, done in 30 days.

• Mississauga, which came in second with 634 requests, completed 390 of 493 requests, or 79.1 per cent, in 30 days.

• With 193, Vaughan fielded just two fewer than Hamilton but completed 156 of 165, or 94 per cent, in 30 days.

• The 30-day compliance rate was 71.4 per cent across 274 municipal corporations in Ontario that received at least one request.

To consider another measure, it took Hamilton more than 90 days to process 15 requests, which represented 8.9 per cent of its completions.

Toronto's rate for the 90-plus-day processing measure was 10.3 per cent and Mississauga was 5.7 per cent. Vaughan didn't take that much time for any requests. Across all municipalities, the rate was 5.3 per cent.

Hamilton's performance is average" when it comes to processing FOI requests and staff don't take lightly" those that take longer than 30 days, Barroso said in an interview.

But clerk Andrea Holland cautioned against drawing too many comparisons with other municipalities.

The privacy commissioner's annual report tallies the number of requests and compliance rates, but it doesn't reflect the volume" of each one.

That's a significant detail, Holland explained, noting requests that don't require many documents can be processed quickly, but some can involve thousands of records, including responses from third parties.

With a very simple FOI, we generally meet those requirements under the act. It's the larger, more complex ones where we don't."

Since 2016, two staffers have been dedicated to FOIs under Barroso, who also helps process requests.

Holland says she's reluctant to ask council for more staff first without exploring other ways to improve the turnaround.

That includes the rollout of a routine disclosure and active dissemination policy" - what Clark calls access by design" - that will allow more public documents to be available through staff at city hall counters.

A full-time privacy specialist who started this past fall is creating the program and training staff to give them a better understanding of what can be released or not.

The hope is that this will help clear the FOI logjam Barroso and her staff experience.

We are optimistic that we are going to be able to help improve our timelines," Holland said.

That's crucial, says Schafer, the University of Manitoba expert, pointing out the more The Spectator waits for time-sensitive files, the less valuable the information can be.

For instance, can the public still find lessons from coronavirus outbreaks - the focus of the Rebecca Towers and basketball team FOIs - a year after the fact?

But Schafer also suggested a problem with timely processing might be in city politicians' self-interest not to rectify."

If they want salient information to be buried so that their role can't be publicly discussed ... then underresourcing officials for FOI would be a way of achieving a veil of ignorance without being held responsible."

Clark said he'd like Hamilton to hit the 90 per cent mark for 30-day compliance and improve processing time overall.

He hopes the routine-disclosure initiative helps with that but also says Barroso's office needs a boost.

In my opinion, they could use more resources, just based on the volume that they're receiving and the amount of work that has to be done."

The city, as a public organization, must place a premium" on transparency and access to information," Coun. Maureen Wilson said.

I think those are values and objectives that should not be of debate."

Katrina Clarke is a reporter at The Spectator. katrinaclarke@thespec.com

Teviah Moro is a reporter at The Spectator. tmoro@thespec.com