Using the New York State Freedom of Information Law (FOIL), Reclaim The Records won the first-ever public access to the 1930-1995 marriage index for New York City, over five million records. It took us nine months, many e-mails, and one lawsuit. We won a settlement in our favor in September 2016, received 110 microfilms covering 1930-1972 and a database covering 1950-1995 — and we even won attorney’s fees! Here’s how we did it…

December 14, 2015: Reclaim The Records writes a friendly “heads up” e-mail to the New York City Clerk’s Office, letting them know that we would soon be submitting a records request to them under the New York State Freedom of Information Law (FOIL). You can read that letter online here. We even provided for them the legal precedent under which we would be making the request. (For the legal nerds out there, it’s Gannett Co., Inc. v. City Clerk’s Office, City of Rochester, 596 NYS 2d 968, affirmed unanimously, 197 AD 2d 919 (1993).) We hoped this letter would ease the way for our records request and help make the whole process run smoothly. Turns out we were naive…

December 30, 2015: We formally submit our records request under the New York State FOIL. As usual, we use the website MuckRock to post and organize all our requests and official responses in real-time, visible to the public. Below is the full text of that letter…

Read More...