This rule revises the regulations applicable to all of the components, bureaus and offices of the Department of the Interior (Department) that process requests for records under the Freedom of Information Act. The revisions clarify and update procedures for requesting records from the Department and procedures that the Department follows in responding to requests from the public.

The Department's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) offices have been overwhelmed by an exponential increase in the volume and complexity of incoming FOIA requests. Between Fiscal Year (FY) 2016 and FY 2018, the number of FOIA requests received by the Department's bureaus and offices increased 30 percent overall while the number of requests received by the Office of the Secretary FOIA office (OS FOIA) increased 210 percent. During that time, the number of particularly time-consuming complex requests also increased by 55 percent for the Department overall and 355 percent for OS FOIA. The Department's effort to respond in a timely and effective manner to the increased number of requests has been further hindered by a significant increase in FOIA lawsuits, primarily brought by requesters that have not received timely responses to their requests. At the close of FY 2018, the Department was defending 129 FOIA cases compared to just 6 cases at the close of FY 2015 and 30 cases at the close of FY 2016. The lawsuits further impair the ability of the FOIA processors to do their work in an orderly and equitable manner because they impose extra duties on the FOIA processors and the litigated requests typically jump the processing queue ahead of the non-litigated requests.

To address this challenge, the Department has begun a comprehensive effort to improve the quality and capacity of the work performed by its FOIA offices that includes better organization and governance, training, technology, and staffing as set out in Secretary's Order No. 3371. This rule is part of that larger effort. It amends the Department's FOIA regulations to increase the capacity of the Department's FOIA offices to respond to FOIA requests in an effective, transparent, and timely manner by making the procedures for processing FOIA requests more efficient and focused on meeting the Department's statutory obligations under the FOIA.

The Final Rule also amends section 2.31(a) of the Department's regulations to conform with the decision issued by the United States Supreme Court, in Food Marketing Institute v. Argus Leader Media, 588 U.S. __(2019) on June 24, 2019 (slip opinion) (“Argus Leader”). The amendment strikes the criteria expressly rejected by the Supreme Court in Argus Leader and replaces it with the criteria articulated by the Supreme Court in that case. With respect to this one amendment, the Department is invoking the “good cause” exemption of the Administrative Procedure Act that provides “when an agency finds that for good cause that public notice and comment procedures are impractical, unnecessary, or contrary to the public interest, the agency may issue a rule without providing notice and an opportunity for public comment.” See 5 U.S.C. 553(b) (3)(B). The Department has determined that notice and comment is unnecessary with respect to this one amendment because the Department has no discretion to apply criteria other than that articulated by the Supreme Court in Argus Leader.