HomeMy WebLinkAboutSupplemental Information Received After Posting of Agenda - Item BRobin Roberts
From: Robert Goldberg <rgoldberg @live.com>
Sent: Saturday, April 22, 2017 3:19 PM
To: Robin Roberts
Cc: Mike Varipapa; Sandra Massa - Lavitt; Ellery A- Deaton; Schelly Sustarsic; Thomas Moore;
Jill Ingram; Bruce Bennett; Joyce
Subject: Free Software for Managing Increasing Numbers of PRA Requests
Hi Robin,
I would like to thank you and your staff for providing excellent customer service in the processing of my
various PRA requests. This has been evident from the date of your hire and ever since. However, I appreciate
from your request for additional staff that the increasing number of PRA's is challenging your office's ability to
maintain this level of service.
Given this challenge, I wanted to share with you information recently provided to me by CalAware regarding
free software for managing PRA's (see
http:/ archives.cjr.org / united_ states_project /recordtrac_ making_ the_ foia _process_less_terrible.php).
"RecordTrac" was designed to both help the public and "for the civic staffers inside the walls of government
who face floods of FOI requests, many of them overly broad or duplicative, outdated paper -based processing,
and no real communication or tracking across departments." RecordTrac sprang from the 2013 Code for
America fellowship program, which partners web developers with local government to tackle a particular
challenge. The City of Oakland was an early adopter as it had been inundated by public- information requests
during the 2011 Occupy protests, and was looking to simplify its disclosure process.
Perhaps your office is already using this or similar software. If not, the software might be worth consideration.
Regardless, thank you again for your dedication to service to our City,
Robert Goldberg