Exhaustion of Administrative Remedies


 * This article is part of a series on Litigation

Introduction
A FOIA requester is generally required to exhaust administrative appeal remedies before seeking judicial redress. However, a requester shall be deemed to have exhausted her administrative remedies with respect to her request if the agency fails to comply with the applicable time limit provisions set forth in FOIA for responding to a request.

Requirements
In order to make a "determination" within the statutory time periods and thereby trigger the administrative exhaustion requirement, the agency must at least: "(i) gather and review the documents; (ii) determine and communicate the scope of the documents it intends to produce and withhold, and the reasons for withholding any documents; and (iii) inform the requester that it can appeal whatever portion of the 'determination' is adverse." "[A]n initial statement that the agency will generally comply with a FOIA request and will produce non-exempt documents and claim exemptions in the future" is insufficient to trigger the administrative exhaustion requirement because it is not a "determination" under FOIA.