Jamie Jelinski filed a freedom of information request in June 2020 regarding the Toronto police's use of facial recognition technology from Clearview AI. Despite paying over $200 for records, he has received inadequate responses five years later. This delay indicates a lack of respect for transparency laws. FOI advocates argue that Ontario's legislation must be updated to enforce compliance, as mandates require timely responses to such requests. Jelinski's situation underscores the challenges faced by individuals attempting to obtain public information.
"To me it suggests they don't respect the legislation that they're supposed to be operating within, they don't respect public transparency," said Jelinski.
"If they didn't intend on disclosing this to me last year, they should not have accepted my money."
Experts say Jelinski's experience highlights why Ontario's access to information legislation needs to be modernized and why it needs to include tools to enforce compliance.
The legislation requires institutions to issue a decision for FOI requests within 30 days and to disclose the records if access is granted in that timeframe.
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