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FOIA and Privacy Act professionals play a vital role in maintaining an open government. Maintaining a distinct job category
for FOIA and Privacy Act professionals creates greater professionalization of the FOIA and Privacy Act workforce - increasing
agency efficiency and responsiveness, promoting accountability, and elevating the importance of the work performed by those
in the Federal Government who are responsible for realizing the Administration's vision of an open and transparent government.
Recognizing the critical importance of the work these individuals perform, the Administration created the new job series Government
Information Series, 0306, in March 2012, and issued a Position Classification Flysheet directing agencies to implement the
change. As of November 2012, twenty-seven agencies employed a total of 229 professionals under the new job series. Implementation
of this commitment resulted from a collaborative effort between the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and the Office of
Information Policy (OIP) in the DOJ, with input from the Department of Defense (DOD) and OGIS, as well as outside stakeholders
with relevant experience, such as the American Society of Access Professionals. The Administration is proud that this commitment
has been met, but also recognizesthat the task of professionalizing FOIA is not over. The U.S. Government will continue to
work to ensure that human resources professionals across the government understand this new job series and give this job series
the proper elevation that it deserves.
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We will continue work on a new civil service personnel category (or job series) for officials who specialize in administering
FOIA and other information programs. It is important to recognize the professional nature of the work done by those administering
FOIA.
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