Case Detail
| Case Title | American Small Business League v. United States Small Business Administration | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| District | Northern District of California | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| City | San Francisco | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Case Number | 3:2008cv00829 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Date Filed | 2008-02-06 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Date Closed | 2008-08-26 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Judge | Hon. Marilyn H. Patel | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Plaintiff | American Small Business League | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Case Description | The American Small Business League submitted a FOIA request to the Small Business Administration for records concerning a list of small businesses named in an agency report. The agency responded that it did not maintain the information in the format requested. ASBL appealed the agency's decision. The SBA upheld is previous decision and ASBL filed suit. Complaint issues: Litigation - Attorney's fees | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Defendant | United States Small Business Administration | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Appeal | Ninth Circuit 08-17072 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Appeal | Ninth Circuit 09-16296 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Documents | Docket Complaint Opinion/Order [10] Opinion/Order [16] Opinion/Order [21] FOIA Project Annotation: A federal court in California has rejected the Small Business Administration's claim that the American Small Business League did not substantially prevail in its FOIA suit against the agency because the SBA did not possess the records requested. Noting the "unusual procedural posture of the SBA's motion," Judge Marilyn Hall Patel pointed out that, rather than a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, the agency's motion was actually one for summary judgment based on the claim that it had not been required to provide agency records. The American Small Business League originally brought the suit after the SBA denied its request for a list of the small business entities and contract amounts on which the agency had based its 2007 Small Business Goaling Report, stating that it had awarded $77.7 billion to small businesses in 2006. Instead, the SBA claimed it did not maintain such a list and that the information was derived from a database maintained by the General Services Administration using parameters furnished by SBA. The agency told the League to contact GSA, but, without the parameters used by the SBA, the League was unable to extract the information from the GSA database. In a May 2008 case management conference, Patel instructed the agency to deliver the requested information, which was received by the League later that month. The SBA then proposed a stipulated settlement in which the League would waive fees and costs. The League refused to do so and the agency filed its motion for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. The SBA never requested or received a list of small businesses from GSA. But Patel noted that "that the SBA never requested nor received from GSA a list identifying small businesses and that it is GSA and not the SBA that manages the underlying raw database, do not alter the conclusion that the records requested by the League were 'agency records' of the SBA. . .[T]he SBA was in 'control' of the records at the time the League made its FOIA request because although it did not have direct access to the raw database, it had the authority and in fact exercised such authority to direct GSA to analyze the database and extract information from it. . .[I]t is the SBA, not GSA, that Congress has charged with the duty to promote the interests of small businesses and to insure that a 'fair proportion' of federal contracts are awarded to such entities. The court finds curious SBA's argument that it does not 'control' the very information it needs to carry out its duties and functions." She indicated that the list had been "created" by the SBA at the time the League made its request. She pointed out that "in computing th[e] statistics, the underlying raw data concerning individual firms and contract amounts awarded must have already been created and in existence. That a list was never printed out in hardcopy format or never exported and saved as a separate electronic file apart from the raw database does not imply that such records had not been 'created' at the time of the FOIA request." She then noted that the EFOIA amendments supported her conclusion. "That the SBA may have had to direct GSA to generate computer code to extract and compile the list of small businesses and contract amounts requested by the League is encompassed in the SBA's obligation to 'search' for electronic records." Patel observed that perhaps the strongest piece of evidence that the list was an agency record was that "the SBA in fact did [deliver the list to the League]. The SBA never claimed that extracting the information from the federal procurement database would be unduly burdensome or would interfere with the Agency's normal operation. It is peculiar that the SBA only now complains that the list was not an agency record when that list has already been searched for, retrieved, and delivered by the SBA."
Opinion/Order [23]Issues: Litigation - Attorney's fees - Prevailing party Opinion/Order [41] FOIA Project Annotation: A federal court in California has awarded the American Small Business League attorney's fees for its suit against the Small Business Administration. After an August 2007 SBA press release stated that $77.7 billion had been awarded in small business contracts in 2006, the ASBL requested a list of the small businesses and contract amounts on which the press release was based. The SBA claimed it had compiled its findings based on a database search by the General Services Administration and that ASBL would need to contact GSA. However, ASBL was not able to obtain the data from GSA because it did not know the search parameters used by SBA. The ASBL then filed suit against the SBA. Judge Marilyn Hall Patel found that the data qualified as an agency record and ordered the agency to disclose it. She then dismissed the case as moot after the agency disclosed the records. The ASBL then came back to Patel with a motion for attorney's fees. After finding that the ASBL was eligible for fees because it had substantially prevailed, Patel next examined whether the ASBL was entitled to fees. The agency argued that the ASBL had not shown that release was in the public interest. But Patel noted that "even though plaintiff does not present a specific argument that releasing the information would benefit the public, it does not follow that no benefit exists." She observed that "plaintiff made its request for a list of the small business entities receiving these contracts and contract amounts awarded, for the purpose of verifying for the public whether these recipients were indeed small businesses. The court finds that plaintiff's request for information furthered a project benefitting the general public�"a project of holding a government agency publicly accountable for the accuracy of its statements and ensuring the agency's compliance with its Congressional mandate." She also pointed out that "because the public benefits from releasing the requested information in order to verify the SBA's public claims about the amount of federal contracts awarded to small businesses, the court finds that [the fact the ASBL is a non-profit organization] weigh[es] in favor of awarding attorneys' fees to the plaintiff." Patel concluded that the agency did not have a reasonable basis in law for denying access to the records. She pointed out that "the court previously determined that the requested records were agency records within the meaning of FOIA because the records were already in existence and were under the SBA's control. Defendant's attempt to argue otherwise is the kind of bureaucratic foot-dragging that FOIA was designed to avoid."
Issues: Litigation - Attorney's fees - Entitlement - Public benefit | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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