RECLAIM THE RECORDS STRIKES AGAIN

Not familiar with RECLAIM THE RECORDS? Reclaim the records likes to sue states under the Freedom of Information Act. And they keep winning! Reclaim the records is a nonprofit with a mission to liberate your information from your state. They have been doing this for some time. You want to know more, go to their website, You be surprised how many records have been liberated from a variety of different states.

Here's the latest.





Their recent newsletter carried the following quote.

"We just filed a new lawsuit, the biggest, baddest Freedom of Information lawsuit that we've ever filed. It's a milestone case, not only for our organization, but also for how genealogists, historians, and researchers as a community deal with government agencies who routinely withhold historical records from the public, and who pass capricious and irrational restrictions on public access. 

Yesterday afternoon, in the Supreme Court of New York, New York County, we filed an Article 78 Petition against the following agencies and people:

• The New York City Department of Mental Health and Hygiene
• The New York City Bureau of Vital Statistics
• The New York City Board of Health
• Oxiris Barbot in her official capacity as New York City Commissioner of Health
• Gretchen Van Wye in her official capacity as New York City Registrar
• And last but certainly not least, Steven P. Schwartz in his official capacity as former New York City Registrar

This Petition challenges not only the Department of Health's refusal to disclose records to us based on New York's Freedom of Information Law (FOIL), but it also challenges the Department of Health's restrictive regulations themselves. Additionally, this is the first time that our organization has gone after actual vital record certificates, as opposed to a records index of some sort."

Keep posted, let's see who gets sued next.