A few weeks ago, Inside Investigator submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to Connecticut’s Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (DMHAS). Unlike most other state agencies, DMHAS does not use GovQA, an online portal that handles FOIA requests. Instead, the agency’s FOI page on its website directs the public to submit requests to a designated email address: FOIA.DMHAS@ct.gov.

But, when I submitted a request there, I was notified shortly after that my request was not deliverable because the email address only accepted messages from ct.gov email addresses or approved senders.

These types of quarantine policies, which can protect users from phishing attempts and malware, are not uncommon in email systems. But any filter that prevents the public from contacting elected officials or agency employees obviously presents a problem. That problem is particularly concerning when it prevents FOIA requests, which public agencies have a legal obligation to respond to, from being received.

I tested that this apparent whitelist wasn’t a one-off issue or that Inside Investigator’s email domain hadn’t been blocked by sending an identical FOIA request from my personal email. When I received the same delivery failure message, I contacted DMHAS’ communications department to alert them to the issue and find out more information about why this was happening and how long it had been going on.

A few days later, I received a message from a DMHAS attorney, which presumably also went to others who had unsuccessfully tried to submit a FOIA request to the agency, saying that requests submitted to their FOI email address in the last 90 days had not been received “due to a technical error” and that, now that the issue had been fixed, requests should be resubmitted.

According to DMHAS, the whitelist was caused by “simple human error.” In April, the agency switched from directing the public to the email address of their FOIA officer to a designated email for FOIA requests. A search of the agency’s FOI page on The Wayback Machine confirms DMHAS made this switch.

“In an effort to create a more sustainable and enduring system, we created an email address (the one you used) to field all FOIA requests in April 2025. The account was tested and shown to be working by the IT team that created and our internal staff. But, they were all using email addresses that had the ct.gov suffix and when the email account was created, someone inadvertently checked the box that it was for internal purposes only. It was purely a mistake.” DMHAS chief of staff Christopher McClure told Inside Investigator.

McClure added that while the FOIA email address went live in April it wasn’t posted on their website until June.

“So, for a short window, the address was utilized and 15 emails were sent to the address. Of those 15, six were internal users testing the account from ct.gov and their personal email addresses, meaning 9 emails came from outside sources- but those were sent from five unique senders. All five senders have been contacted regarding their FOIA requests with the email address now properly working.” McClure stated.

I have since submitted a FOIA request to that address and received a confirmation it was received by the agency.

This incident highlights the importance of FOIA’s requirement that public agencies confirm receipt of a request. In Connecticut, the law gives agencies four business days to respond to a request.

In most cases, state agencies are using GovQA, which automatically sends out confirmation immediately after a request has been submitted. In cases where state agencies are directing the public to email or receiving requests through other forms, like paper mail, someone at the agency has to manually reach out to the requester and confirm they’ve received the request.

If you’re submitting FOIA requests, you should not only be looking out for that confirmation but also tracking how long it’s been since it was sent.

If you don’t receive confirmation, likely your request hasn’t been received, perhaps due to an email or mail issue, or because agency staff aren’t paying as much attention as they should be to their FOIA duties. In either case, if four business days pass without receiving a confirmation, you should reach out to an agency to verify they’ve received your request.

If, as recently occurred with DMHAS, you run into a situation where you cannot submit a FOIA request, you should also reach out to the agency.

According to Russell Blair of the Freedom of Information Commission, if you run into a situation where you cannot submit a FOIA request through an agency’s preferred method, whether that be via email or through an online tool like GovQA, you can send a general email to the agency from which you’re requesting information.

“As long as it is the right agency, there is no “wrong” person to send an FOI request to. For example, if someone were to file an FOIA request with the FOI Commission, it could be sent to foi@ct.gov or our secretary, executive director or myself, and each one of us would be obligated to respond and make sure the person received the records they requested.” Blair told Inside Investigator.

As a journalist, my first point of contact when I can’t identify the right person to talk to about a particular issue is an agency’s communications department. They frequently direct media to the right person to handle a request and can be a good starting point to reach out about FOIA issues. A list of communications contacts for each state agency can be found at our FOI Directory, as can contact information for many FOIA officers.

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