LITTLE ROCK – Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott, Jr. announced today that Chief Deputy City Attorney Alex Betton will lead the newly aligned FOIA Division and ordered an overhaul of the City’s procedures regarding public requests for information, as his office continues to improve its efforts to promote transparency.

The City receives hundreds of requests every year for records covered under the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act. Over the years, those requests have grown in breadth and complexity, one of the factors that has sometimes attributed to a delay in response times.

“I came into office with a pledge to be accountable, clear and transparent. We’ve done that by making hundreds of city records readily available on our open data website and being accessible to the public through outreach programs and City Hall pop-ups,” Mayor Scott said. “Even so, there are ways we can improve our FOIA procedures to expedite responses and improve communications with requestors.

“The changes we are implementing immediately will result in better dialogue with Arkansas citizens who request public records and allow us to better manage the influx of records requests we receive on a daily basis. We’ll work to eliminate logjams in the FOIA process and make sure requestors and the public know the status of pending records requests.”

Mayor Scott said website updates will go live this week on the LittleRock.gov homepage showing what FOIA requests have been received to date in 2022 and whether any are still outstanding. The homepage will also be updated with a web form and link to directly submit a request or contact the City’s FOIA coordinator. Ultimately, the City will post frequently requested records online for public access.

Earlier this year, Mayor Scott approved the purchase of a new software to process FOIA requests more efficiently and effectively, but HR has faced delays in its implementation. Known as NextRequest, the software includes tools to help reduce staff time needed to gather and prepare documents, resulting in faster responses to requestors. FOIA requestors will be able to access documents with a secure log-in, which is especially helpful when dealing with large attachments that exceed an email account’s size limits. Chief Deputy Betton will oversee its implementation by September 1.

Meanwhile, the City will conduct FOIA refresher training for all department heads in the coming days. In addition, Mayor Scott directed staff to eliminate some internal procedural steps that had unintentionally slowed the process of responding to requestors. The FOIA Coordinator has also been empowered to discuss with requestors whether the City may need additional time to respond to complex or broad requests.

“We take FOIA requests seriously, and it has always been our intention to reply to them completely and promptly. Doing so is a priority,” Mayor Scott said. “I believe these changes will result in a much-improved process, and we will look for additional ways to improve how we respond to FOIA requests as needed.”

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