FEDERAL
SECTOR REPORT
May 1997
(c) P2C2 Group,
Inc.
FREEDOM OF
INFORMATION:
THE
BACK
DOOR TO MARKETING INTELLIGENCE
WHY USE FOIA?
For government
procurement
competitions, you need all of the information that you can find. This
is true whether you are seeking competitive grants or contracts,
competing for tasks under indefinite quantity contracts, or selling
from a GSA schedule. Bid and grant announcements provide the front door
to information about competitions, but government documents gained
through FOIA requests provide a big back door for gaining marketing
intelligence.
The Freedom Of
Information Act
(FOIA) makes a broad range of government documents and data publicly
available. Federal agencies have FOIA offices that coordinate the
responses to requests for information. By law, the agency must provide
a prompt response to your request. In some cases, you will be charged
for photocopying and/or preparation of the information.
FOIA documents
are useful
throughout the procurement lifecycle. Early intelligence will help you
assess whether to invest in a competition. You may also
gain technical information that enables your proposals and
presentations
to do a better job of demonstrating that you understand the agency's
goals, requirements, and "hot buttons." Of course, you may also gain
information about the strengths and weaknesses of your competitors.
Before you FOIA
a document, you
ought to determine whether the information is publicly available
without using the FOIA procedure. Some popular documents--such
as the annual procurement plan for the fiscal year, the program plan
for grants, copies of key contracts recently awarded--are immediately
available without a FOIA request. If publicly available, you may be
able
to obtain the document within hours without following the FOIA drill.
Congressional hearings, General Accounting Office Reports, and NTIS
documents are additional sources that do not require FOIA.
ELECTRONIC ACCESS
In 1996,
Congress enacted
legislation (HR-3802, known as the Electronic Freedom of Information
Amendments of 1966) requiring that all government agencies respond to
FOIA inquiries electronically. The congressional intent
is to speed the time-consuming and expensive process of preparing and
declassifying information for public consumption. A variety of
technologies are included, such as Internet e-mail and web access,
fax-back systems, and Internet fax.
Of course,
implementing the
electronic systems is taking time, and you will need to check with each
agency to determine when and to what extent you can begin retrieving
information electronically.
THE VALUE OF
INTERMEDIARIES
You may want to
have a
consultant, law firm, or another organization submit the FOIA request.
While you have a right to access public information, some federal
individuals in agencies become irritated by these requests. Moreover,
you may not want the agency or your competitors to know prematurely of
your interest in a specific program or topic.
One of the intermediaries is FOIA Group Inc., which (for a fee) offers
a broad range of FOIA support including government document retrieval,
searchable databases, and legal services. The company was founded by
Jeff Stachewicz, an attorney with formidable government FOIA
experience.
SOFTWARE FOR FOIA
MANAGEMENT
FOIA-Ware is available for
initiating and managing FOIA requests and is offered by the FOIA
Group Inc., mentioned above. The website is www.foia.com.
OPPORTUNITIES AT
GOVERNMENT SITES
There are
numerous business
opportunities for FOIA support--especially for contractors engaged in
systems integration and document management. Imagination Software, for
example, has developed software to assist agencies in complying with
the legislation requiring electronic responses to FOIA requests.
IMAGinE FOIA is one of the software products being used by the FBI to
declassify and prepare information for electronic release. According to
the company, the software is "the only application on the market that
is specifically designed to imitate the actual work process these
agencies use . . . For example, IMAGinE FOIA offers processors an easy
way to highlight sensitive information to be redacted from a document,
and include a text overlay to explain why the item has been exempted
from public view."
BOTTOM
LINE
Knowledge is a
principal form
of capital for government contractors and grantees. Documents acquired
through the FOIA process provide access to
some of the capital necessary to be successful, and the new electronic
retrieval procedures will make knowledge acquisition more cost
efficient than it has been in the past. Of course, making information
more accessible means your competitors will likely have more knowledge
as well.
