FOIA Fees

Copies of public records required to be disclosed pursuant to a proper FOIA request shall be made available to the requester in accordance with the terms and conditions specified in the Act, upon the payment of copying fees in accordance with the following schedule of fees, which is prominently displayed at the Palos Township Hall:

First 50 pages of standard black and white copiesNo charge
After the first 50 pages (standard black and white copies)$0.15 per page
Color copesActual cost of duplication
Disc, or other record mediumActual cost of duplication ($0.26 per CD)
Certification of document$1.00 per record

Recurrent Requester: The Illinois Freedom of Information Act defines a "Recurrent Requester" as a person who:

  1. Makes at least 50 requests within a 12 month period; or
  2. Makes at least 15 requests for records within a 30 day period; or
  3. Makes at least 7 requests for records within a 7 day period.

​If the township determines someone to be a "Recurrent Requester" the Township reserves the right to extend the response time for each subsequent request to 21 days.

Voluminous Requests: The Illinois Freedom of Information Act defines a "Voluminous Request" as a request for records that:

  1. Include more than 5 individual requests for more than 5 different categories or records or a combination of individual requests that total requests for more than 5 different categories of records in a period of 20 business days; OR
  2. Requires the compilation of more than 500 letter or legal-sized pages of public records

If the township determines a request to be "Voluminous", the Township reserves the right to extend the reply time or demand that the request be reduced to manageable portions.

Other Allowable Fees: The Freedom of Information Act allows public bodies to charge, and the Township shall assess, additional fees as follows:

Requests for electronic documents NOT kept in PDF format:

  • $20 for up to 2 MB of data
  • $40 for >2 MB to 4 MB of data
  • $100 for more than 4 MB of data

Requests for electronic documents kept IN PDF format:

  • $20 for up to 80 MB of data
  • $40 for >80 MB up to 160 MB of data
  • $100 for greater than 160 MB of data