Social Security Administration

Social and Rehabilitation Service

(d) The operating agencies may establish such other information centers as they may hereafter determine. Upon the establishment of such additional center(s) the operating agency shall publish in the FEDERAL REGISTER a notice thereof, containing the address thereof, materials to be maintained therein, and the official who has a like responsibility to that of the Information Center Officers provided for in § 5.32 or § 5.53.

[32 FR 9315, June 30, 1967, as amended at 32 FR 14895, Oct. 27, 1967; 38 FR 22231, Aug. 17, 1973; 39 FR 28631, Aug. 9, 1974; 40 FR 26512, June 24, 1975]

§ 5.32 Freedom of Information Officers.

(a) Only Freedom of Information Officers as listed below have the authority to release or deny records in response to Freedom of Information Act requests.

(1) HHS Freedom of Information Officer. If the records you seek are addressed to or from an official or office of the Office of the Secretary, including OS Staff Divisions, or if the records you seek are the records of any organizational unit of the Department not specifically identified below, or if the records you seek involve more than one Operating Division of the Department, only the HHS Freedom of Information Officer or his or her designee, may determine whether to release or deny the records.

(2) Regional Freedom of Information Officer. If the records you seek are addressed to or from an official or office of the Office of the Regional Director

(i.e., Office of the Secretary, including OS Staff Divisions, in regional Offices), or if the records you seek involve more than one Operating Division in the region, only the Regional Public Affairs Director, who also is the Regional Freedom of Information Officer, or his or her designee, may determine whether to release or deny the records.

(3) OHDS Freedom of Information Officer. If the records you seek are exclusively records of the Office of Human Development Services, including its records in the regions, only the Director, Office of Public Affairs, OHDS, who also is the OHDS Freedom of Information Officer, or his or her designee, may determine whether to release or deny the records.

(4) PHS Freedom of Information Officer. If the records you seek are exclusively records of the Public Health Service, or if the records you seek involve more than one health agency of the Public Health Service, including its records in the regions, only the Director, Office of Public Affairs, PHS, who also is the PHS Freedom of Information Officer, or his or her designee, may determine whether to release or deny the records except as follows:

(i) CDC Freedom of Information Officer. If the records you seek are exclusively records of the Centers for Disease Control, only the Director, Office of Public Affairs, CDC, who also is the CDC Freedom of Information Officer, or his or her designee, may determine whether to release or deny the records.

(ii) FDA Freedom of Information Officer. If the records you seek are exclusively records of the Food and Drug Administration, only the Assistant Commissioner for Public Affairs, FDA, who also is the FDA Freedom of Information Officer, or his or her designee, may determine whether to release or deny the records.

(iii) NIH Freedom of Information Officer. If the records you seek are exclusively records of the National Institutes of Health, only the Associate Director of Communications, NIH, who also is the NIH Freedom of Information Officer, or his or her designee, may determine whether to release or deny the records.

(5) SSA Freedom of Information Officer. If the records you seek are exclusively records of the Social Security Administration, including its records in the regions, only the Director, Office of Information, SSA, who also is the SSA Freedom of Information Officer, or his or her designee, may determine whether to release or deny the records.

(6) HCFA Freedom of Information Officer. If the records you seek are exclusively records of the Health Care Financing Administration, including its records in the regions, only the Director, Office of Public Affairs, HCFA, who also is the HCFA Freedom of Information Officer, or his or her designee, may determine whether to release or deny the records.

(b) The Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs must concur in any designations and in any further delegations of these authorities.

[47 FR 20309, May 12, 1982]

§ 5.33 Duty hours.

The Information Centers shall be open to the public on regular work days during the regular duty hours of the installation where located.

§ 5.34 Material in the information centers.

Materials maintained in information centers need not be uniform in each center. A center will normally have materials particularly related to the component's programs and mission. Every effort will be made by an information center to obtain, upon request,

(a) A request for any information or record may be made at (1) the Department's Central Information Center, (2) any Regional Office Information Center, or (3) any subsidiary Information Center. A request may also be made at any appropriate office of the Department.

(b) Requests made at the Central or a Regional Office Information Center for information or records not located there shall, if reduced to writing by the requester, be forwarded to the proper office. If a request is made at any other Center or office of the Department and the information or record is not located where the request is made, the requester shall be referred to the proper Center or office, or if the request is put in writing it may be forwarded to the proper office.

(c) A request should reasonably identify the requested record by brief description. Requesters who have detailed information which would assist in identifying the records requested are urged to provide such information in order to expedite the handling of the request. Envelopes in which written requests are submitted should be clearly identified as a Freedom of Information request.

(d) Determination of whether records will be released or withheld will be made within 10 working days from date of receipt in the office having custody of the records or the appropriate information center. This time may be extended by written notice for no longer than an additional 10 working days, only in unusual circumstances. Unusual circumstances mean:

(1) The need to search for and collect the requested records from field facilities or other establishments that are separate from the office processing the request;

(2) The need to search for, collect and appropriately examine a voluminous amount of separate and distinct records which are demanded in a single request; or

(3) The need for consultation, which shall be conducted with all practicable speed, with another agency having a substantial interest in the determination of the request or among two or more components of the agency having substantial subject-matter interest therein.

If such extension is made, the requester will be notified in writing with an explanation of why the extension was necessary and the date on which a determination will be made.

[40 FR 26512, June 24, 1975]

§ 5.52 Copies of records.

Copies of available records shall be produced as promptly as possible upon receipt of the fee therefor. Copying service shall be limited to not more than two copies of any single page, except that additional copies may be made where administrative considerations permit. Records which are published or available for sale need not be copied.

§ 5.53 Release and denial of records.

Determinations to release or deny records in response to Freedom of Information Act requests will be made only by those officials listed in § 5.32 of this part, or as otherwise provided by regulation. Determinations to release or deny records will be in writing, signed by the appropriate Freedom of Information Officer. Discloseable records will be provided promptly and in accordance with the policies, schedule, and procedures contained in Subpart E of this part. If records or portions of records are denied, the written response will contain the reasons for the denial including, as applicable, a reference to the specific exemption of the FOIA authorizing the withholding or deletion. The notice will also provide the requester with appropriate information on how to exercise the right of appeal under Subpart G of this part. Such notification shall also set forth the names or titles and positions of each person responsible

for the denial of such request if such person is other than the appropriate Freedom of Information Officer. [47 FR 20310, May 12, 1982]

Subpart E-Fees

SOURCE: 47 FR 41753, Sept. 22, 1982, unless otherwise noted.

§ 5.60 Policy on fees.

The fees described in this part apply to FOIA requests. They reflect direct search and duplication costs which the FOIA permits us to collect. The fee schedule is not intended to imply that fees must be charged for responding to FOIA requests nor is it meant as a substitute for any other schedule of fees. Our policy is that we will not charge for processing a FOIA request when the cost of collecting the fee would exceed the amount of the fee.

§ 5.61 Fee schedule.

(a) Our fee schedule is: (1) Manual searching for records-$10 an hour; (2) Photocopying standard-size pages-10¢ per page;

(3) Photocopying odd-size pages, such as punch cards, or blueprints, or reproducing other records, such as magnetic tapes-actual cost of the operator's time up to $10 an hour, plus the cost of the machine time and the materials used;

(4) Use of electronic data processing equipment to obtain records-our actual cost for the service, including computer search time, runs, printouts, and time of computer programmers and operators, or other employees;

(5) Certifying that records are true copies whenever we are asked to do so-$10 per certification;

(6) Postage-actual cost;

(7) Sending records to you by special methods that you request, such as Express Mail, actual cost of the special service;

(8) Performing other special services that you request and that we agree to do-actual cost to us of the time of our employee who performs the service, plus the cost of any machine time and materials that the employee uses;

(9) Search and reproduction of records of Social Security number hold

1

ers,

wage earners, employers and claimants-full cost as determined under section 1106(c) of the Social Security Act.

(b) We may charge you for search time, even though we fail to find the records, if you request that we continue the search after we have informed you that it is unlikely to be productive. We also may charge you for search time if the records we locate are exempt from disclosure.

§ 5.62 Procedures on assessing and collecting fees.

(a) We will generally assume that when you send us a request, you agree to pay search and copy fees. You may specify a limit on the amount you are willing to spend. We will notify you if it appears that the fee will exceed the limit and ask whether you nevertheless want us to go ahead.

(b) Normally, we will send you a bill along with or following our delivery of the records you asked for. However, in order to avoid sending numerous small bills to frequent requesters, or businesses representing requesters, we may aggregate the charges for certain periods. For example, we might send a bill to such a requester once a month.

(c) If you have failed to pay previous bills, or if it appears likely that the search and duplication costs will be substantially larger than you have agreed to pay, we may ask you to pay the estimated fee, or a deposit, before we start searching for the records you requested, or before we send them to you. If so, we will let you know promptly upon receiving your request. In such cases, the administrative time limits prescribed in section (a)(6) of the FOIA (i.e., ten working days from receipt of initial requests and twenty working days from receipt of appeals from initial denials, plus permissable extensions of these time limits) will begin only after we have come to an agreement with you over payment of the fee, or have decided that fee waiver or reduction would be appropriate (see § 5.63).

(d) Payment of fees will be made by check or money order payable to "U.S. Department of Health and Human Services" or to the unit stated in the

billing and will be sent to the billing unit.

§ 5.63 Waiver or reduction of fees.

Only Freedom of Information Officers as designated in § 5.32 of this part may waive or reduce a fee where they determine that furnishing the information will primarily benefit the general public. They will consider factors such as those listed below. The existence of one of the factors standing alone, however, would not mean we would automatically waive or reduce the fee.

(a) Whether it is probable that you will disseminate the information to a large number of people. For example, we might waive or reduce the fee if you are a newspaper reporter, have a contract for a book with a publisher, or have often written material that was later published.

(b) Whether the records that you requested contain information which could actually be used to benefit people. We would be more disposed than otherwise to waive or reduce fees when there was strong need for public attention to matters that the records concerned. Records in that category would, for example, include those that bore on the safety, health, or economic well-being of the public, or the integrity and efficiency of government. In such cases, individuals who will benefit need not know about the records themselves or directly receive the information they contain.

(c) Whether release of the records would result primarily in your financial benfit. For example, we would usually expect you to pay the fees if you are engaged in commercial or financial activities in which you normally pay for goods and services in the conduct of business. In such circumstances, taxpayers ordinarily should not be expected to pay the FOIA fees for you. Even in these situations, however, if release of the information would otherwise benefit the general public, and if payment would impose a hardship on you such that you and the public would not receive the information if the full fee were to be charged, we may waive or reduce the fee.

(d) Whether release of the records would help indigents and others of very limited means for whom it would be a hardship if they were required to pay a fee. For example, where release of the records would help you obtain economic benefits, employment, education, or other basic rights and services, and you sent us an accurate statement that paying the fees would amount to a hardship, we would be inclined to waive or reduce them.

(e) Whether you helped us reduce unnecessary costs to the government. For example, you might focus your request so we could in turn focus the scope of our search and thereby eliminate unnecessary search costs. We would take that into consideration along with other factors.

(f) Whether we have already made the information available to others. For example, we would probably refuse to waive or reduce the fees if you requested records that we had already made available for inspection by any member of the public. We would also consider whether records containing the same information are available elsewhere. In such cases, we will inform you where this information is available.

§ 5.64 Review of a denial of request to waive or reduce fees.

If you have been denied a fee waiver or reduction, you may appeal to an official listed in § 5.82. You should specify the manner in which release of the record will benefit the general public. Also, you may appeal agency fee determinations to the same officials.

Subpart F-Availability of Specific Records

SOURCE: 38 FR 22232, Aug. 17, 1973, unless otherwise noted.

$5.70 Policy.

This subpart specifies the types of records which the Department shall, in keeping with its policy of fullest possible disclosure, make available for inspection and copying. For clarity and purposes of guidance, there are also set forth below the kinds or portions of records which generally will

not be released, except as may be determined under § 5.74. The appendix to this part contains some examples of the kinds of materials which, in accordance with § 5.72, will generally be released and other materials which, in accordance with § 5.73, are not normally available. Implementing regulations (see § 5.11) may provide for disclosure of records, beyond that provided for in § 5.72. In the event that any record contains both information which is disclosable and that which is not disclosable under this regulation, the nondisclosable information will be deleted and the balance of the record disclosed.

[40 FR 26513, June 24, 1975]

§ 5.71 Protection of personal privacy and proprietary information.

As set forth with more particularity below, certain types of information in whatever record or document contained shall not be disclosed where disclosure would be inconsistent with individual rights of personal privacy or would violate obligations of confidentiality.

(a) Except to the extent specifically otherwise provided by implementing regulations (see § 5.11), no disclosure will be made of information of a personal and private nature, such as information in personnel and medical files, in welfare and social security records and any other information of a private and personal nature.

(b)(1) Except as provided in paragraph (b)(2) of this section, information concerning the identity, diagnosis, prognosis or treatment of any patient, obtained from records or entries in records maintained in connection with the performance of any drug abuse prevention function authorized or assisted under the Drug Abuse Office and Treatment Act of 1972 (21 U.S.C. 1175) or any act amended by that Act, will not be disclosed except as provided in section 408 of that Act and the regulations issued pursuant thereto by the Special Action Office for Drug Abuse Prevention (21 CFR Part 1401). Those regulations are incorporated herein by reference and made a part hereof as if fully set forth herein.