Hey everyone!

I am curious if any of you have ever sent a Freedom of Information Act request to find out more information about a location. Did they respond? Did you get any documents that helped curve your curiosity? I'm curious to hear your stories.

I just sent one off, along with a nice letter (figure it couldn't hurt) and I figure they will either help me out or give me the brush off. We will see.

I'm curious to hear if anyone else has done this, and what your results were. Thanks!

Without naming names Id be interested in knowing (in general) what sort of location / information youre after is it a former military base? Property owned or seized by the Feds?

p.s. made your thread private unless you insist on public viewery of it or others answers to your question..

I figured I may get more info if I left it public. I am not sure how to turn it back to private once I have posted it.

I'll PM you on the specifics

Nevermind I see you already did it. That is fine.

its public now good luck with your search

I've not done it, but it seems like an interesting way of getting information. Kinda curious as to what information you might be seeking, that a FOIA would be required.

I'll warn you though, asking information about a government area may raise some suspicions, which could make exploration more difficult.

Atleast one person up here in MSP has done it. They had requested information about critical infastructure however and were denied. So if unless you're requesting info on a mom and pop biz or a small house good luck.

Your best resources for whatever it may be are likely Historical Society and Google.

Good luck

I'm with 2x on this one. Unless it was military (and a closed base)I really don't see why going to the Feds is a good idea. It's one thing to talk to local cops, it's a whole other ballgame to invite the full force of the federal government looking into who you are and why you're asking. With paranoia running rampant and trillions spent on "keeping us safe" you seeking info on any government installation just seems like a good way to raise your profile with people who don't fuck around.

I should be more clear, it was a FOIA request sent to the county where the place in question is. I looked on the county website and it looked like this was the formality to go through to request property records and anything pertained to the property. I guess it would be like me showing up in person requesting to see the records. So I apologize for the confusion. I guess we will see what happens.

Haha, yeah someone did the municipal-level equivalent and was essentially told that releasing drain maps would cause the drains to fill with ISIS or something

I've heard various levels of success from various people. Supposedly a lot of agencies are just too lazy to look in their archives and will deny that any of the requested documents exist until you find a copy somewhere else and wave it in their face. Or they'll claim the documents got thrown out or lost. If you're pretty certain they're just blowing you off, you can sometimes get results by going over the person's head to a supervisor or agency head (if you can find their contact info).

I sent the request to the county administrator instead of the recorder. I'm sure it will get tossed down to the recorder, or they will take one look and laugh and write denied. I hope not but one can wish.

Place was built in 1867 and supposedly closed in 1961. So I'm sure some digging will be required. It's not a very populated county so maybe they won't be swamped, and can give a little effort to it. I'll admit it's a shot in the dark, but I've scoured Google with about every keyword I can think of and haven't come up with a whole lot. I know infinitely more than I did when I started, but I want to know more. Lol.

I don't see why they wouldn't honor the request as long as its just harmless historic research and nothing nefarious or DHS sensitive like a dam or a power station etc.

It all sort of depends if its something the county state feds have record of, I mean I doubt they have a record of ordinary abandoned commercial buildings except for land surveys, tax rolls etc which is all public available anyway or costs you 2 bucks at the courthouse or something.

This one is worth the price of a stamp just to see what comes back I think. Who knows maybe it was used as an illegal distillery during prohibition and they have arrest records or something cool like that!

Yeah that would be cool! Hopefully I'll hear something by next week.

By the way if any FM's want specifics on what I'm looking into, let me know.

I received an email today from the county, they found 31 documents dating back almost 40 years. I wasn't expecting much but this has blown me away! Thank you all for the insight!

I'm curious on what you'd need an FOIA for. Digging into the history of the place?

Another thought, how would you word it? I'm kinda interested to submit one of my own now. There's a couple sites that I can think of that I wouldn't mind knowing more about.

I think its just how this particular County does their requests. Other areas may be different. I just worded it "any and all documents pertaining to the building at bla bla." Then I added the letter to fill in the specifics. I was shocked at the response.

Sorry for the late late update, but I did get some documents back! Almost 80 pages worth! Its a lot of legal mumbo jumbo, but it helped me with some new searches which opened some other new things on the place. Including backing up some eyewitness stories that I had gotten on the place. It did lead to some more questions.

The next thing I would like to do is go to their local library and see if I can find any more information. I even found some pictures, on a Wisconsin historical page of all places (the place is in Illinois)

As far as wording the request, all I did was write "Any and all information pertaining to the property at bla bla bla." The lady I dealt with was very accommodating.