📑:
Using OPRAmachine to file public records requests without the hassle
Streamline your public records requests with New Jersey’s public records request & research platform.
Gavin Rozzi
Presented by the Montclair University Center for Cooperative Media
August 21st, 2018
Transparency matters
but getting results from NJ government can be be difficult
OPRAmachine
is a tool that is simplifying public records requests in New Jersey
OPRAmachine
allows users to send & track public records requests
It then publishes all documents & correspondence online
OPRAmachine
is built on the premise that everything should be public.
Everything from the initial request, to the final documents / disposition
OPRAmachine
helps individual users get an answer to their request.
And its database of public records gets bigger everytime the site is used.
The Open Public Records Act
Gives you several important rights:
- You can access any record “made, maintained or kept on file”*
- Custodian must approve or deny request in 7 business days
- Challenge denied requests in superior court or at the GRC
*exemptions apply
The OPRA request process
Generally, no matter how the request is submitted, the following steps take place:
- Public agency responds, requests an extension, or denies request
- Citizen obtains records, or challenges denial in court or at the GRC
Introducing OPRAmachine
OPRAmachine launched in October, 2017. Within its first month, its database expanded to cover all 565 municipalities in New Jersey.
Modernizing public records
OPRAmachine eliminates many of the past pains of the public records request process:
- No wasteful paper forms or in-person visits
- No fees per page for paper copies / paying for postage
- No dealing with ancient fax machines
Modernizing public records
The platform also introduces several new features:
- Request updates by town and keyword
- Advanced search of requests / responses
- A searchable database of governnment agencies and public records
By the numbers
Since our launch in October, 2017:
927 government agencies
2341 OPRA requests
10 GB of public documents & data archived
How the site works
To enable advanced features, each request is assigned a unique tracking ID
Here’s one of them: 8f40bc9f
How the site works
The tracking ID is used to generate a unique email addres for each OPRA request.
Sample: opra+request-1966-8f40bc9f @requests.opramachine.com
How responses are handled
When government agencies reply to the request, the site detects the tracking ID. This allows responses to OPRA requests to be automatically published online and with the correct request.
Advantages of our approach
Since the OPRA requests are created on our site and ultimately sent via email, no proprietary softare is needed by government agencies. And paper waste is eliminated.
- For clerks, responding is as simple as hitting “reply”
- Can easily be integrated with existing email systems
Filing requests
All you need is a valid email address to get started filing requests.
- Select the government agency to send your request
- File up to 7 requests per day (contact us if you need more)
- Wait for a response and follow up with the agency as necessary
- Classify your OPRA request when you get a response
Note on anonymous requests
The OPRA law allows citizens to request records anonymously if they choose.
We believe OPRAmachine is the best way to file anonymous requests because user email addresses are never published or revealed to government agencies.
Only each OPRA request’s unique email is ever visible to the public or government.
Filing requests
OPRAmachine will notify you when your request gets a response. You’ll get an email with a link to view the response online.
Classifying requests
An important part of the request process on OPRAmachine is classifying the status of requests. Users receive a survey when they get a response to describe the state of their OPRA request.
Why classify requests?
We ask users to classify requests so we can track outcome and trigger site functionality based on the request’s status.
Since users initially request the records, it’s easiest for them to classify their own requests
Request states on OPRAmachine
There are several states that requests can be classified into, including:
Successful
Partially Successful
Gone Postal
More request states
Delivery Error
Info Not Held
Refused
Long Overdue
Tracking OPRA requests
OPRAmachine lets you track requests & responses on multiple levels:
- Your own OPRA requests
- Other people’s requests
- All requests sent to a particular agency
- All requests containing a keyword
Tracking updates are sent daily via email.
Tracking OPRA requests
A good source of leads for stories!
See what topics others are researching and view documents!
Monitor topics and geographic areas from a unified interface
Tracking alerts help keep public bodies compliant with OPRA’s time limits and reporters on deadline.
Use case: tracking OPRA requests and searches
One use case we have identified is that some users will register for an account only to receive tracking updates and not to file their own requests, showing how the public records are being used by 3rd parties.
Using OPRAmachine for research
OPRAmachine has several features that make it attractive a research platform.
- Advanced search features
- Batch OPRA requests
- Data and API access
Advanced search functionality
OPRAmachine’s advanced search tool can help you narrow down requests and documents and requests even further.
Filter content by the following criteria:
- File type (CSV, XLS, PDF, DOC etc.)
- Requester
- Public body
- Date range
- Type of public body
Advanced search functionality
opramachine.com/advancedsearch
Example: advanced search
Here are some sample queries:
Batch requests
We are enabling comparative research using OPRA with the batch request feature.
This allows the same request to simultatenously be delivered to multiple government agencies & tracked.
Currently access to this feature is restricted to prevent abuse
Batch requests in action
Here are some succcesful batch OPRA requests:
The impact
- More people are learning about public records and OPRA
- Seeing OPRA requests and documents helps individuals make sense of what can be a complex process
- Users can build off of the work of other requesters
- The public knows more about the inner workings of government
Teaching users how to OPRA
The site has exposed more people to OPRA and public records, helping them to be better informed
By viewing requests and responses, requesters can draft better OPRA requests and know what to expect
Case study: Jeff Epstein taught citizens how to use it while researching issues in an NJ school district
A word from OPRAmachine Administrator Jeff Epstein
- Before & after OPRAmachine
- Benefits to journalists
- Limitations of the underlying Alaveteli platform
- User support requests re: sensitive information
Who is using OPRAmachine?
The following groups of users are some examples of who is on our platform:
- Journalists
- Nonprofits
- Concerned citizens
- Attorneys and paralegals
- Private investigators
- Consultants and private investigators
- Public policy researchers
- Government employees
The challenges
Running a project like this is not without its difficulties. Challenges that we have faced could be categorized as either technical or legal / moderation.
The technical challenges
- Ensuring servers don’t go down during business hours
- Rerouting responses that went to the wrong request or didn’t come through
- Educating clerks about the unique addresses our system uses and resolving user issues
The legal / moderation challenges
- Certain jurisdictions are outright refusing requests sent via OPRAmachine.
- Some records custodians have failed to redact social security numbers and other private information
- As a site primarily based on user-generated content, we deal with concerns about potential misuse of the platform and spam
The Social Security Number problem
There have been multiple incidents where municipal government and police departments have inadvertently disclosed social security numbers and other confidential personal identifiers
In each instance of one of these types of disclosures, we immediately took down the material to prevent harm to individuals
Our solution: automatic redaction
Our software can automatically redact certain patterns of text.
This is currently deployed for email addresses on the site. Email addresses are automatically replaced with X’s to prevent automated spam bots from harvesting addresses from the site.
Later in 2018, we will deploy this technology for social security numbers. We hope that this will alleviate most instances of unintentional disclosures & further protect user privacy.
The big picture
The more than the sum of individual OPRA requests
As an archive of public knowledge
- Requests and documents are indexed by Google, a driver of new traffic to the site
- Users can easily share requests via social media, showing the platform’s potential to distribute public records
- Journalists can link to primary source documents and use them in their stories
The future: OPRAmachine Pro
A fully featured OPRA toolkit for professional journalists & investigators, OPRAmachine Pro
will be launching soon to sustain our development
Our core service will always remain free
OPRAmachine Pro
Pro features:
- Keep requests private
- Unlimited batch requests
- Advanced features & custom request management tools for power users
OPRAmachine Pro
Affordable for individuals and organizations
Just $10 per user per month
We are currently accepting pre-registrations from anyone interested in signing up for an OPRAmachine Pro account, with the launch of Pro services to be announced at a later date.
API for developers
OPRAmachine data is open and accesible from multiple endpoints :
- JSON REST API
- RSS data feeds
- OPRA request SQL and CSV request databases
API data accesss
Data can be requested on several levels, including by:
- Town / county / public agency
- Individual users and requests
- OPRA request classification (succesful, unsuccessful etc.)
API Example: Using OPRA RSS data to automate social media posts
- You can use a service like IFTTT to automatically post new content whenever an OPRA RSS feed is updated.
- We use this approach to update the OPRAmachine Twitter feed everytime a new OPRA is answered.
Response by New Jersey Department of the Treasury to Gavin Rozzi on August 17, 2018.
— OPRAmachine (@OPRAmachine) August 20, 2018
Successful.
Thanks,
Department of the Treasury
Government Records Access Unit
609-633-1300
STATE OF … https://t.co/KFdev7zzX6
API Example: Using OPRA RSS data to automate social media posts
One other potential application of this is to automatically post all OPRA requests for a given town on a town website or Facebook page.
API Example: Using OPRA JSON data to show a user’s OPRA requests
This example can be seen live with current data on my personal website gavinrozzi.com
The code for this is open-source on Github
These slides are online!
Questions?
Thank you for attending our webinar!
Contact the OPRAmachine team:
Email: info@opramachine.com
Phone: (732)-504-3636