What is a FOIA request & why should I care?
Freedom of information act is the tool we can use to mine data from government agencies that is not readily available from typical list & data sellers. Some cities & agencies are very cooperative, others give you the run around, provide unusable data or simply ignore your requests. It's a delicate art sometimes, & sometimes you run into a dead end or a rabbit hole. But sometimes BOOM you hit a nice deep rich vein of gold. Would I spend a ton of time on it...No, there are some activities you need to prioritize. Make a promise to spend maybe 15-20 hrs over the rest of the year requesting lists & following up on rejections & denials for data from some agencies: i.e. Code Enforcement, Health Department, Public Safety, etc. You just may uncover a hidden goldmine. If you join Summer School I will touch on some things that have worked for me.