Rights & Responsibilities:

The Rights of Requesters and the Responsibilities of Accomack County

Under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act 

The Virginia Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), located § 2.2-3700 et seq. of the Code of Virginia, guarantees citizens of the Commonwealth and representatives of the media access to public records held by public bodies, public officials, and public employees.

For any requests for records from a constitutional office or outside entity, please direct your request specifically to that office's FOIA Officer whose contact information  can be located by clicking on the name below:

A public record is any writing or recording -- regardless of whether it is a paper record, an electronic file, an audio or video recording, or any other format -- that is prepared or owned by, or in the possession of a public body or its officers, employees or agents in the transaction of public business.  All public records are presumed to be open, and may only be withheld if a specific, statutory exemption applies.

The policy of FOIA states that the purpose of FOIA is to promote an increased awareness by all persons of governmental activities.  In furthering this policy, FOIA requires that the law be interpreted liberally, in favor of access, and that any exemption allowing public records to be withheld must be interpreted narrowly.

 FOIA Officer for Accomack County, Virginia,
23296 Courthouse Avenue - Room 203
P. O. Box 388
Accomac, VA 23301

telephone:  (757) 787-5700  l  facsimile:  (757) 787-2468

Your FOIA Rights

• You have the right to request to inspect or receive copies of public records, or both.
• You have the right to request that any charges for the requested records be estimated in advance.
• If you believe that your FOIA rights have been violated, you may file a petition in district or circuit court to compel compliance with FOIA.  Alternatively, you may contact the FOIA Council for a nonbinding advisory opinion.

*As of July 1, 2022, pursuant to Virginia Code Section 2.2-3704, the County may make reasonable charges incurred in responding to a FOIA request, not to exceed its actual costs for accessing, duplicating, supplying, or searching for requested records. If you make a request for public records under FOIA, you have the to request a cost estimate in advance of the County supplying the requested records. Costs shall include the costs incurred by the County in making the estimate. If the County determines in advance that the cost for producing the requested records is likely to exceed $200, the County may require you to pay a deposit not to exceed the amount of the cost estimate. The time within which the County must respond to a FOIA request will be tolled i) between the time a cost estimate is provided and a response is received from the requester, and ii) between the time the County requests a deposit and the deposit is paid. If the County does not receive a response from the requester within 30 days of sending the cost estimate and, if applicable, also requesting a deposit, the request shall be deemed withdrawn.

** As of July 1, 2023: Accomack County makes every effort to fill FOIA requests free of charge. However as required by Virginia Code 2.2-3704.1, the County does not have a fixed charge for accessing and searching for requested records. We base the charge on the hourly rate of the person searching for the records in question. To keep cost at a minimum, the County attempts to identify and use the lowest paid staff member who can search and retrieve the requested records need for the specific request. In situations where a staff member is required to search through his or her own emails and records, the staff member will search for the requested records and the search charge will be based on that individual employee's hourly rate.

Making a Request for records from Accomack County 

• You may request records by U.S. Mail, fax, e-mail, in person, or over the phone.  FOIA does not require that your request be in writing, nor do you need to specifically state that you are requesting records under FOIA.

• Your request must identify the records you are seeking with "reasonable specificity."  This is a common-sense standard.  It does not refer to or limit the volume or number of records that you are requesting; instead, it requires that you be specific enough so that we can identify and locate the records that you are seeking.

• Your request must ask for existing records or documents.  FOIA gives you a right to inspect or copy records; it does not apply to a situation where you are asking general questions about the work of Accomack County, nor does it require Accomack County to create a record that does not exist.

• You may choose to receive electronic records in any format used by Accomack County in the regular course of business.

• If we have questions about your request, please cooperate with staff's efforts to clarify the type of records that you are seeking, or to attempt to reach a reasonable agreement about a response to a large request.  Making a FOIA request is not an adversarial process, but we may need to discuss your request with you to ensure that we understand what records you are seeking.

Additionally, the Freedom of Information Advisory Council is available to answer any questions you may have about FOIA.  The Council may be contacted by e-mail at foiacouncil@dls.virginia.gov, or by phone at (804) 225-3056 or [toll free] 1-866-448-4100.

The County’s Responsibilities in Responding to Your Request:

• The County must respond to your request within 5 working days of receiving it.  "Day One" is considered the day after your request is received.  The 5-day period does not include weekends or holidays.

• The reason behind your request for public records from the County is irrelevant, and you do not have to state why you want the records before we respond to your request.  FOIA does, however, allow the County to require you to provide your name and legal address.

• FOIA requires that the County make one of the following responses to your request within the 5-day time period:

1. We provide you with the records that you have requested in their entirety.

    

2. We withhold all of the records that you have requested, because all of the records are subject to a specific statutory exemption.  If all of the records are being withheld, we must send you a response in writing.  That writing must identify the volume and subject matter of the records being withheld, and state the specific section of the Code of Virginia that allows us to withhold the records.

    

3. We provide some of the records that you have requested, but withhold other records.  We cannot withhold an entire record if only a portion of it is subject to an exemption.  In that instance, we may redact the portion of the record that may be withheld, and must provide you with the remainder of the record.  We must provide you with a written response stating the specific section of the Code of Virginia that allows portions of the requested records to be withheld.

    

4. We inform you in writing that the requested records cannot be found or do not exist (we do not have the records you want).  However, if we know that another public body has the requested records, we must include contact information for the other public body in our response to you.

    

5. If it is practically impossible for the County to respond to your request within the 5-day period, we must state this in writing, explaining the conditions that make the response impossible.  This will allow us 7 additional working days to respond to your request, giving us a total of 12 working days to respond to your request.

If you make a request for a very large number of records, and we feel that we cannot provide the records to you within 12 working days without disrupting our other organizational responsibilities, we may petition the court for additional time to respond to your request.  However, FOIA requires that we make a reasonable effort to reach an agreement with you concerning the production or the records before we go to court to ask for more time.

Costs

• A public body may make reasonable charges not to exceed its actual cost incurred in accessing, duplicating, supplying, or searching for the requested records. No public body shall impose any extraneous, intermediary, or surplus fees or expenses to recoup the general costs associated with creating or maintaining records or transacting the general business of the public body. Any duplicating fee charged by a public body shall not exceed the actual cost of duplication. All charges for the supplying of requested records shall be estimated in advance at the request of the citizen as set forth in subsection F of § 2.2-3704 of the Code of Virginia.

• You may have to pay for the records that you request from the County.  FOIA allows us to charge for the actual costs of responding to FOIA requests.  This would include items like staff time spent searching for the requested records, copying costs, or any other costs directly related to supplying the requested records.  It cannot include general overhead costs.

• If we estimate that it will cost more than $200 to respond to your request, we may require you to pay a deposit, not to exceed the amount of the estimate, before proceeding with your request.  The 5 days that we have to respond to your request does not include the time between when we ask for a deposit and when you respond.

• You may request that we estimate in advance the charges for supplying the records that you have requested.  This will allow you to know about any costs upfront, or give you the opportunity to modify your request in an attempt to lower the estimated costs.

• If you owe us money from a previous FOIA request that has remained unpaid for more than 30 days, we may require payment of the past-due bill before we will respond to your new FOIA request.

Types of records
The following is a general description of the types of records held by us:

• Personnel records concerning employees and officials of the County
• Records of contracts which the County has entered into
• Minutes of meetings
• Accounts payable records

Commonly used exemptions 

The Code of Virginia allows any public body to withhold certain records from public disclosure.  The County commonly withholds records subject to the following exemptions, but may also withhold records subject to any allowable statutory exemption on a case by case basis: 

• Personnel records (§ 2.2-3705.1 (1) of the Code of Virginia)
• Records subject to attorney-client privilege (§ 2.2-3705.1 (2)) or attorney work product (§ 2.2-3705.1 (3))
• Vendor proprietary information (§ 2.2-3705.1 (6))
• Records relating to the negotiation and award of a contract, prior to a contract being awarded (§ 2.2-3705.1 (12))
• Policy regarding the use of exemptions 

• The general policy of the County is to invoke the personnel records exemption in those instances where it applies in order to protect the privacy of employees and officials of the County.  
• The general policy of the County is to invoke the contract negotiations exemption whenever it applies in order to protect the County’s bargaining position and negotiating strategy.