The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) was created as an attempt to ensure public records are publicly accessible, at least where public agencies are concerned.

Its definition of public agency is fairly broad, encompassing most state-level offices (except the Division of Criminal Justice) and their subdivisions, as well as municipal agencies and their subdivisions. The law also stipulates that private entities can be deemed the functional equivalent of a public agency and can be required to release public records upon request. Connecticut courts have developed a four-part test to determine when a private organization rises to that standard.

But even with that test, for a lot of organizations it isn’t necessarily clear whether they meet that standard and, because they’ve never received a FOIA request, the answer hasn’t been established.

Among the organizations that fall into this category is the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference (CIAC), a nonprofit organization that “serves as the sole governing body for inter-scholastic athletic activities in Connecticut.”

Since its founding in 1921 and until recently, the CIAC has not been the subject of a FOIA request.

But when Anastasia LeBeau submitted a request for records to CIAC and its partner organization, the Connecticut Association of Schools, in May 2024, the request was denied on the grounds it is not a public organization.

But LeBeau believes CIAC should be subject to FOIA, in part because she says 80 percent of its membership fees are ultimately paid by the public.

Now, she’s taking her argument to the Freedom of Information Commission (FOIC).

According to CIAC’s website, the group was formed in 1921 by a group of high school principals who “stepped forward to protect the interests of student-athletes” over concern about “a proliferation of unregulated high school athletic activities.”

In 1953, CIAC merged with the Connecticut Association of Secondary Schools to “create a new organization with the resources to serve the needs of secondary school students in all areas of interscholastic activity.”

Today, any public or parochial school in the state accredited by the Connecticut State Department of Education, along with any private school that either “serves the community as a public school” or holds associate institutional in CIAC’s partner organization CAS, can become a member. According to their website [vi]rtually all public and parochial high schools in Connecticut are dues-paying members of the CIAC.”

The organization is responsible for organizing high school sports schedules and tournaments, determines athletic eligibility, and makes health and safety rules for athletic competition, among other activities.

On May 29, 2024 LeBeau requested a variety of documents from CIAC, including:

• Salaries for all paid employees, including mileage reimbursement and bonuses, for 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023
• Salary and reimbursement documents related to CIAC assistant director Dan Scavone from his hire date in 2019, as well as “applications and documents” and information on whether his position is appointed or elected
• The number of complaints involving allegation of abuse by officials
• Records of paid vacation days taken by paid employees
• Records on all properties owned by CIAC
• Records related to payments and documentation from Amity Middle School and Amity High School
• Records relating to the process to file a complaint against an umpire
• Documentation related to a specific umpire, including background investigations, payments, and complaints
• Records related to de-escalation training CIAC members received
• Records related to monetary scholarships CIAC had paid in the last 20 years

After receiving no response, LeBeau followed up on June 17 requesting a response by the end of the business day or she would file a complaint with the FOIC.

CAS-CIAC director Glenn Lungarini responded the next day. He stated that the email address LeBeau had used for him was not correct—although he was not the only person the email was addressed to—and would not provide the information because CIAC is a non-profit.

“I am not providing the requested information. However, I would be willing to meet with you and do my best to inform you of CAS-CIAC operations.” Lungarini wrote.

LeBeau instead turned to the FOIC, filing a complaint with the CIAC in early December 2024.

Though LeBeau’s case has not yet been heard, existing information on CIAC points to the likely finding that it is not a public agency.

“On the CIAC website they are described as a nonprofit so I’d tend to think they might be exempt from FOIA, however, any records they share with a school district become public records.” Russell Blair, the FOIC’s Director of Education and Communications told Inside Investigator.

Blair noted that while the commission has not heard a complaint on the CIAC before, another complaint against an athletic conference was administratively withdrawn earlier this year after the FOIC declined to schedule a hearing because it did not involve a public agency.

In that complaint, Chris Everone alleged that the Southern Connecticut Conference violated FOIA when it did not respond to a request for emails and correspondence “relative to the matter involving East Haven High School and their request to participate in the SCC Hockey tournament” after ten days.

The commission declined to schedule a hearing in the matter because it did not allege FOIA had been broken. “The FOIC only has jurisdiction over regional, state and municipal public agencies within Connecticut.” the notice informing Everone a hearing read.

In comments included with the notice, the commission’s clerk suggested making a request directly to the school district, since that was a public agency.

An Office of Legislative Research (OLR) report from 2016 on CIAC noted that while the FOIC had never been asked to determine whether it was subject to FOIA, private, nonprofit organizations like it are “generally not subject to FOIA.” The report also noted that CIAC is a “private entity to which public entities…have delegated their legal authority to oversee the organization of high school athletics.”

The OLR report also noted a FOIC decision from 1988 where a school superintendent was required to disclose redacted correspondence with the FOIC because the school district was found to be a public agency.

In the complaint, George Bozzi sought correspondence between Lyman High School or Wallingford school system representatives and CIAC representatives “concerning the reporting of CIAC regulation violations committed by the school’s football team in 1987, as well as any action taken by the CIAC.”

The complaint was denied on the grounds they were exempt from disclosure because they contained information about the team’s coach’s performance and releasing them would violate portions of FOIA that relate to personnel records.

But the FOIC found only some of the records evaluated the coaches’ performance and records that did not, and instead related to the football team’s violation of CIAC records, were not exempt. The commission ordered the records released, with portions that related to the coach’s performance redacted.

This decision seems consistent with Blair’s assessment that while the CIAC may not be subject to FOIA, any records it shares with school districts are public records and would be required to be disclosed under the law.

An eventual determination by the FOIC about whether CIAC is subject to FOIA will likely look to the functional equivalence test. Established by the Connecticut Supreme Court as part of a 1980 ruling, the test asks whether an entity performs a governmental function, whether it was created by government, the level of government funding an entity receives, and the extent to which government is involved or regulates the entity.

An organization does not need to satisfy all four prongs of the test in order to be considered the functional equivalent of a public agency and the test is applied on a case-by-case basis, meaning that the conditions that make one entity a public agency may not result in the same outcome for another entity.

As OLR’s 2016 report notes, CIAC is self-governing and “[n]either the legislature nor any governmental agency oversees the organization.” CIAC has an “internally elected board composed of member school representatives” as well as its own constitution and bylaws. It was also not founded with any government involvement.

In 2022, the legislature passed a law that created a task force to study CIAC’s structure and internal procedures, including the process by which positions are filled and how it handles complaints. But the law only required the task force to create a report on their findings; there were no further legislative directives involving oversight or management of CIAC.

On the question of the level of government funding, LeBeau believes that because CIAC receives funding in the form of membership fees from public schools, whose budgets come from taxpayer dollars, this effectively means the majority of the conference’s funding is public and they should therefore be subject to FOIA. LeBeau claimed that 80 percent of CIAC’s membership fees are paid by public schools. She also said the organization pockets income from tickets sold to the public, which she thinks should be considered public funding.

“I think the complaint is important because they collect huge amounts of money by the public schools who are paid by taxpayers and they refuse to release how much money they make as income from charging admission fees at public events. The majority of their operations function on [the] public’s money. Then they get vouchers? For what? Gas reimbursement, food? Again, public money.” LeBeau told Inside Investigator.

She said she expects that when the case comes before the FOIC, the ruling will go in her favor.

Inside Investigator reached out to CIAC for comment about whether they believe they are subject to FOIA but received no response.

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