VIRGINIA
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION
ADVISORY COUNCIL
COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA
FOIA
Training
Among
other powers and duties, subdivision 2 of § 30-179 of
the Code charges the Council to conduct training seminars
and educational programs for the members and staff of public
bodies and other interested persons on the requirements of
FOIA. The Council views its training duty as it's most important
mission and welcomes every opportunity to provide FOIA training
presentations. In fulfilling its statutory mission to conduct
educational programs about FOIA, the FOIA Council provides
several different types of training, all free of charge, as
detailed below.
Accredited
Courses
There
are currently three different types of training programs presented
by Council staff that are preapproved for credit for attorneys
and/or law-enforcement as described below. Each of these courses
must follow the stated agenda and time limits as agreed with
the accrediting organization. While these courses offer credit
specifically for attorneys and law-enforcement personnel,
any interested person is welcome to attend. Additionally,
please note that other organizations including the Virginia
Municipal Clerks Association and the Virginia School Board
Association have also given credit for attending training
by the FOIA Council, although such training is not separately
preapproved.
--
Access to Public Records Course - This course covers
FOIA policy, what constitutes a public record, who has Virginia
FOIA rights, the procedures for making and responding to requests
for public records, charges, and an overview of some of the
most commonly used exemptions from mandatory disclosure. This
course is preapproved for 1.5 hours of Continuing Legal Education
credit from the Virginia State Bar.
Access
to Public Meetings Course - This course covers FOIA
policy, what constitutes a "public body" and a "meeting,"
procedural requirements for conducting open meetings, closed
meetings, and electronic meetings, and an overview of some
of the most commonly used closed meeting exemptions. This
course is preapproved for 1.5 hours of Continuing Legal Education
credit from the Virginia State Bar.
Access
to Public Meetings In-Person Training Date:
Law-Enforcement
Records Course - This course provides an overview
of the procedures for making and responding to public records
requests and address records and procedures specific to law-enforcement
such as criminal incident information, criminal investigative
files, noncriminal incident reports, 911 call records, dash
and body-worn camera videos, public safety exemptions, and
other provisions of law outside of FOIA that may also affect
access to law-enforcement records. This course is preapproved
for 2.0 hours of Continuing Legal Education credit from the
Virginia State Bar as well as 2.0 hours of in-service credit
from the Department of Criminal Justice Services.
In addition
to these courses that are preapproved for credit by other
agencies, staff provides live training for local officials
and FOIA officers to satisfy the statutory training requirements
of §§ 2.2-3704.2 and 2.2-3704.3, as well as training
by arrangement that may be tailored to the needs of specific
groups or agencies, as described below. Please note that all
of the training presentations by Council staff satisfy the
FOIA training requirements for FOIA officers, local elected
officials and others required to receive FOIA training (see
below), including the accredited courses described above.
Additionally, please note that the required biennial FOIA
training may also be provided by legal counsel for the public
body (i.e. your local government or agency attorney) as well
as by the FOIA Council staff.
Local
Officials Course - This course is designed for local
officials (including constitutional officers) and the executive
directors and members of industrial development authorities
and economic development authorities who are required to receive
FOIA training pursuant to § 2.2-3704.2. The course covers
FOIA training requirements, FOIA policy, the role of the FOIA
Council, procedures related to public records requests, the
conduct of public meetings, statutory remedies for FOIA violations,
and additional resources for local officials. This course
may be presented live in person or online (webinar), and there
are also prerecorded versions of it as described further below.
Local
Officials Training Webinar Date:
•
July 30, 2025, at 10 a.m.
FOIA
Officers Course-
There is a course for FOIA officers hosted on the Commonwealth
of Virginia Learning Center (COVLC)(https://covlc.virginia.gov/Default.aspx).
Please note that due to recent upgrades to the COVLC system,
there is no longer a portal for registration by non-state
employees. If you are a state employee or already have a COVLC
account, you may continue to take the FOIA training hosted
on COVLC. If you do not already have an account, you can contact
us about creating one for you, but as of January, 2023, we
were informed that there are problems with the manual account
creation process. For that reason, you may wish to use one
of the other FOIA training alternatives instead (note that
there is no specific content requirement for FOIA officers,
so we would generally recommend taking whichever course or
courses best fits your role within your public body).
Training
by arrangement - Council staff also provides training
upon request to interested groups, such as the staff of state
and local agencies, members of local governing bodies, media
organizations, citizen organizations, and any other group
that wishes to learn more about FOIA. Organizations requesting
training are encouraged, but not required, to consolidate
training by including other interested organizations within
a single or neighboring jurisdiction(s) wherever possible.
This training is available year-round, and may be presented
in person or using virtual meeting or webinar software. Staff
can present one of the courses described above or a presentation
can be tailored to meet the needs of the particular group.
Tailored presentations can range from 30 minutes to several
hours, and can present a general overview of FOIA or focus
specifically on particular exemptions or portions of FOIA
frequently used by that group or organization.
If you
are interested in scheduling a live FOIA training presentation,
please call the FOIA Council at (804) 698-1810 [Richmond area]
or 1-866-448-4100 [toll free]. We suggest that you contact
us as soon as you have potential dates in mind for training
so as to avoid scheduling conflicts.
Pre-recorded
online training
As mentioned
above, the Council provides two different pre-recorded online
training courses, one designed for FOIA officers and the other
designed for local officials, as alternatives to live training
in order to satisfy the statutory training requirements (see
below).
FOIA
Officers - § 2.2-3704.2
The
course for FOIA officers is hosted on the Commonwealth of
Virginia Learning Center (COVLC) (here).
After logging in to COVLC, choose "FOIA-Freedom of Information
Act" from the list of courses on the right-hand side
of the page title "Browse Categories." The course
consists of a tutorial that should take less than an hour,
followed by a 15 question quiz. You must answer 12 questions
correctly (80%) to pass the quiz. After completing the tutorial
and passing the quiz, you will have the option to print a
certificate showing that you completed the online training.
Please note that you do not need to send us copies of your
certificate, but you should keep it for your records to document
that you completed the required training.
FOIA
Officers List
FOIA
officers are also required to provide their names and contact
information to the FOIA Council so that we can maintain alist
of FOIA officers available to the public. Such
information must be submitted by July 1 of the year the FOIA
officer is initially trained, and then updated if and when
it changes. (Note: The requirement used to be to submit the
information each year by July 1, but as of July 1, 2020, it
has been amended so the information only needs to be submitted
once initially and updated if there are changes.)
There
are two ways to submit your name and contact information:
1) Click
here
to use the online version of the form. It requires a free
registration, but once done, it will automatically add your
information to the FOIA officers list. Please use this form
if this is the first time someone is registering as a FOIA
officer for the public body. (In order to prevent tampering,
if someone else is already registered as FOIA officer for
the public body, the online form will not work to add or remove
anyone. If the public body's FOIA officer changes, please
notify us by email or use the Word version of the form below.)
2) Click
hereto download a Microsoft Word version of the same
form that you may send to us by email (foiacouncil@dls.virginia.gov)
or print and send by regular mail, if you prefer. Please use
this form if someone else is already registered as FOIA officer
for the public body, so that IT staff can remove outdated
information from the list while updating with the new information.
Local
elected officials - § 2.2-3704.3
As of
July 1, 2020, all local elected officials and executive directors
and members of each industrial development authority and economic
development authority are required to receive FOIA training
"within two months after assuming the local elected office
and thereafter at least once during each consecutive period
of two calendar years commencing with the date on which he
last completed a training session." To facilitate this
training, we have developed a FOIA training course specifically
for local elected officials that should take less than an
hour to complete. Please note that there is no requirement
for a training certificate, but the law requires that the
clerk of a governing body or school board keep records of
such training for five years, so please be sure to let your
clerk know when you have taken a training course. Note also
that there is no requirement to send records of this training
to the FOIA Council, and unlike FOIA officers, we do not maintain
a list of elected officials who have completed FOIA training.
This
pre-recorded online training program is temporarily unavailable
as it is being updated to reflect changes in the law.
Additionally,
for attorneys who wish to provide training for their clients,
please note that a PowerPoint version is available here
as an resource to use in conjunction with live training (please
note that the PowerPoint version does not satisfy the training
requirement by itself, it is only meant to be used in conjunction
with live training).
