In Frank Curry and FOIABuddy v. South Western School District, AP 2024-1311, a school district (“District”) received a request for records related to IT operations, contracts, staff, and IT budget from Frank Curry and FOIABuddy (“Requester”).  The District denied the Requests, notifying the Requester that they had been unable to confirm that he was a qualified requester under the RTKL, and that his requests would be denied as anonymous unless and until he provided the District with evidence that he is was a qualified requester.

Section 702 of the RTKL provides that:

Agencies may fulfill verbal, written, or anonymous verbal or written requests for access to records under this act. If the requester wishes to pursue the relief and remedies provided for in this act, the request for access to records must be a written request.

Section 702 gives the discretion to fulfill or ignore anonymous requests. A “requester” is defined by the RTKL as “[a] person that is a legal resident of the United States….” See 65 P.S. § 67.102. Thus, under the RTKL, a requester must both be a “person” and “a legal resident of the United States.”

On appeal, the District submitted exhibits demonstrating that Frank Curry is not a legal resident of the United States and, therefore, did not qualify as a requester.   To do so, the District showed how FOIABuddy’s system could produce an anonymous or de-anonymized request.  It further demonstrated that requests from “Frank Curry” are anonymous requests because: 1) FOIABuddy has an anonymous option; 2) that the anonymous option lists a Pennsylvania residency; 3) the listed phone number set forth on “Frank Curry” requests simply results in an automated message from FOIABuddy itself, stating that no questions regarding FOIA requests would be returned.  On the other hand, the District demonstrated that when a requester submits a request through the non-anonymous function, the actual contact information of the requester is set forth on the request.   

In other words, the District demonstrated that “Frank Curry” is as anonymous as “John Doe” and the OOR agreed that the District had no duty to fulfill the anonymous request.