Vancouver police ignore FOI requests for chief's communications

For nearly a year, the Vancouver Police Department has failed to fulfill two freedom of information requests seeking records from Chief Adam Palmer and other high-ranking officials – a situation transparency advocates call highly concerning, and potentially illegal.

For nearly a year, the Vancouver Police Department has failed to fulfill two freedom of information requests seeking records from Chief Adam Palmer and other high-ranking officials – a situation transparency advocates call highly concerning, and potentially illegal.

Under B.C.’s Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, public bodies such as government ministries and policing agencies are not only required to comply with FOI requests, but to do so within a reasonable timeframe.

That generally means responding within 30 days, though extensions are allowed under some circumstances.

“For an institution to be found not complying with the law – especially a law enforcement institution, I might add – is not a good look,” said Mike Larsen, president of the Freedom of Information and Privacy Association, a non-profit advocacy organization.

A provincial watchdog is reviewing the police department's response to the FOI requests, but has yet to make any findings.

Larsen noted that taxpayer-funded bodies are not supposed to have a choice about whether they will make a good-faith effort to provide records to the public they serve.

“An FOI request is not really a request,” he added. “It’s a legal mechanism.”