As Freedom of Information Act requests skyrocket, one Grand Valley State University student has been hit with a $84,000 bill for requesting documents related to a Title IX case that he is involved in with an employee.

The law is vague about fees for FOIA documents. In some instances, excessive fees and red tape are ways to prevent people from accessing public records.

In the GVSU FOIA case, Carrie Uthe, the student’s mother, said the FOIA documents are very important to her son’s second Title IX case he filed with the university. Her son continues to wait for a response from the school.

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“My son, if he needs to adjust his request, he needs to be told so and the school hasn’t told him to do so,” she told The Midwesterner. “They also avoided him and did not allow him to have a hearing for this case, which they should have.”

The second formal complaint, which was filed by Uthe’s son against the GVSU employee, alleged “unprofessional conduct, harassment, bullying and coercion that occurred during the original Title IX case.” He is concerned about receiving further harassment if he spoke to the media.

Uthe’s son requested documentation from the university to explain the $84,000 FOIA fee. GVSU  previously told reporters from 13 On Your Side it used its normal process for calculating the FOIA fee. In a prepared statement, the university stated the request is “very broad” and would involve having to get a “qualified employee” to sift through more than 59,000 emails to redact protected and personal information.

However, there is software that makes redacting protected information fairly straightforward. Uthe’s son also replied and offered a reasonable fee to pay for the requested documents. The university did not respond to his reasonable fee offer nor provide potential strategies that could help reduce the costs, Uthe told The Midwesterner.

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This additional information would have potentially supported his case and provided the information needed for the Title IX third party decision maker toward supporting his claim. He lost the written decision as he was not offered a hearing for his second case as was planned, Uthe said.

“He’s trying to get the documents to prove his claim,” Uthe said. “There are software programs where you put in the word and it redacts it automatically. He’s not asking for audio or video. He’s just asking for emails and documentation tied to the communications within that claim.”

The case is under appeal and could use the FOIA documentation. In a Title IX case, a subpoena is not an option, Uthe said, adding she has heard from other families encountering similar issues with FOIA requests at universities.

“In a Title IX case, the victim has very limited means to get documentation,” Uthe said. “He is very concerned unreasonable and uncustomary fees like this are happening to other student’s Title IX cases as well.”

Michigan’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) allows the public to request access to records from public agencies, including public universities. There are no initial fees to submit a FOIA request. The act does provide for “certain types of fees in some instances,” and the agency can charge for the time it takes to search their records and other fees.

The university previously told reporters it used its normal process for calculating the FOIA fee. According to Mike Walsh, an attorney and adjunct faculty member at GVSU (who’s not involved with the case), government agencies have the right to charge for their time but he’s never seen a bill that large.

“The whole spirit of the law is to open things up, to share records with the true owners, which is you and me,” Walsh previously said.