The former director of an Advanced Behavioral Health (ABH) subsidiary is asking the Freedom of Information Commission (FOIC) to rule on whether ABH is a public agency subject to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).
Melissa Ortiz, the former director of ABH subsidiary Solutions EAP, contracted by the state to provide assistance for people facing issues like drug and alcohol dependency and financial uncertainty, filed a complaint with the FOIC in November 2025 after ABH officials denied her FOIA request.
Ortiz, who has filed a lawsuit against ABH after she was ultimately fired after filing a whistleblower complaint alleging the inappropriate use of state contract funds, asked ABH to turn over an investigation report the agency conducted in response to those allegations via a FOIA request she filed on November 13, 2025. Ortiz also sought minutes and correspondence from the attorney who reportedly conducted the investigation.
ABH denied the request the same day, stating that because they are a private company they are not subject to FOIA.
In her complaint, Ortiz notes that ABH’s funding comes from public sources and has contracts with multiple state agencies, including the Department of Children and Families and the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services.
“Because ABH holds individual state contracts exceeding $5 million, the agency is required to submit annual reports to the Office of Policy and Management. Despite this, Marjorie Barse, Chief People Officer for ABH, denied my request on the basis that ABH is a private entity. This assertion is inconsistent with Connecticut law; organizations that are primarily funded by state and federal dollars are subject to public accountability under FOIA, especially when the requested records relate directly to the use of public funds.” Ortiz wrote in her complaint to the FOIC.
Private organizations aren’t necessarily exempt from FOIA. If they receive public funding and perform public functions, particularly because a public entity has tasked them with doing so, they can be the “functional equivalent” of a public agency and subject to FOIA, at least for the equivalent public services they perform.
In 1980, the Connecticut Supreme Court created a four-part test to determine when private organizations are performing government functions.
The case was based on a FOIA request submitted to Woodstock Academy by a group of the town’s residents, which was denied on the grounds that it was not a public entity.
The legislature granted Woodstock Academy a charter in the 1800s to serve as a secondary school since the town does not have a public high school. While the town designates other schools in the area for high school students to attend, most students attend Woodstock Academy.
The school’s funding for tuition comes from municipalities who send students there. At the time of the court case, roughly 75 percent of the school’s funding came from Woodstock.
The Connecticut Supreme Court’s ruling incorporated a test used by federal courts to determine when a private organization is behaving as the functional equivalent of a public agency.
The four elements include:
- whether the organization performs a governmental function
- the level of government funding it is receiving
- the extent of government involvement or regulation
- and whether the organization was created by the government
The Woodstock test is now what the FOIC and state courts use to determine if a private organization is the functional equivalent of a public body and therefore subject to FOIA. In its ruling on the Woodstock Academy case, the Supreme Court found that applying the test on a case-by-case basis is “best suited to ensure that the general rule of disclosure underlying this state’s FOIA is not undermined by nominal appellations which obscure functional realities.”
A later ruling in 1991 also clarified that no single element of the test can be conclusive. All four elements must be considered “cumulatively.”
The majority of ABH’s funding comes from state grants, totaling roughly $40 million annually, according to Ortiz’s complaint, which could be a factor in whether the company is an equivalent public agency.
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