Dear New Jersey Economic Development Authority,

This is a request for public records made under the common law right of access. I am not required to fill out an official form. Please acknowledge receipt of this message.
Records requested:
A roster or spreadsheet identifying all grant applicants seeking funding to operate or expand a business within a New Jersey designated Opportunity Zone. Request is limited to applications submitted February 1, 2022 to April 6, 2022. Please provide name of business entity, name of principal, city where business will be conducted/supported, county where business will be conducted/supported, mailing address city/county, if different than business location where funding would be used, amount of funds requested, current grant application status. The public has a right to know how the funding is being distributed and if the distributions are equal across all areas of New Jersey relative to the number of applications submitted from each opportunity zone. The public also has a right to know the applicant names so as to check them against records on file with the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission. The purpose is to make sure NJEDA funding decisions are not influenced by political donations in the state.

Yours faithfully,

Finn Gurlycher

Dear Shamira Alvarez,

The request for information is the same as one already produced to someone else. The only difference is that I asked for the dollar amount requested for each applicant who is located in an opportunity zone. Why does it take three weeks to add a column to a spreadsheet, please?

Yours sincerely,

Finn Gurlycher

Dear Shamira Alvarez,

Thank you for letting me know your agency requires a second threw week extension. The New Jersey Government Records Council, has a series of decisions on which it states that the request must be "reasonable." A custodian can not simply request an extension to kick the can down the road without some objective explanation to establish reasonableness.

To avoid adversarial proceedings on this matter, please provide an explanation that does not include the volume of requests for records as that reason was already used once.

Please refer to Ciccarone v. N.J. Dep’t of Treasury, GRC Complaint No. 2013-280 (Interim Order dated July 29, 2014). Since that time, the GRC has looked to Ciccarone, GRC 2013-280, to make a reasonableness determination in other complaints. See Rodriguez v. Kean Univ., GRC Complaint No. 2015-114 (April 2016); Rodriguez v. Kean Univ., GRC Complaint No. 2016-196 (February 2018) when formulating a response under the reasonableness standard.

Yours sincerely,

Finn Gurlycher

Dear Shamira Alvarez,

Please note your agency has made teo requests for extensions of time to produce records. I can see on OPRA machine that your agency produced a spreadsheet to someone else with similar data. I am asking for a similar spreadsheet. My request is limited to applicants with grants for small businesses within opportunity zones. The only difference is that my request seeks the dollar amount requested by each applicant.

Six weeks of extensions without any justification exposes your agency to a challenge under the unreasonable delay provisions found in case law published by the GRC. To date, a good reason has not been provided for the delay. Multiple OPRA requests is not an acceptable reason because my request merely asks for a column of data added to a spreadsheet you produced to another person. Six weeks is unreasonable given the simplicity of the tasks.

Yours sincerely,

Finn Gurlycher