Michigan Freedom of Information Act: 5 Business Days, Fees, and How to Appeal

Michigan's Freedom of Information Act gives any person, with one notable exception, the right to inspect and copy state and local government records, with a 5 business day response deadline, tightly capped fees, and a free internal appeal to the head of the public body before any lawsuit.

This page covers Michigan state and local records under Act 442 of 1976. Records held by federal agencies run under the federal Freedom of Information Act, which shares the name but not the rules: see how to file a FOIA request. For the corresponding rules in the other 49 states, start at our public records laws by state hub.

Who can request, and the two exclusions that surprise people

MCL 15.233 states the core right: "upon providing a public body's FOIA coordinator with a written request that describes a public record sufficiently to enable the public body to find the public record, a person has a right to inspect, copy, or receive copies of the requested public record." The request must include your name, address and contact information unless you qualify as indigent under section 4(2)(a).

There is no residency condition. There is, however, a status exclusion that Michigan writes directly into the definition of "person" at MCL 15.232(g): "Person does not include an individual serving a sentence of imprisonment in a state or county correctional facility in this state or any other state, or in a federal correctional facility." Incarcerated individuals therefore cannot use Michigan FOIA at all, which is a real divergence from federal FOIA and from most other state records laws.

The second surprise is on the government side. MCL 15.232(h) defines "public body" broadly across the executive branch, the legislative branch and local government, but carves out two significant categories:

• The governor's office. The executive branch definition "does not include the governor or lieutenant governor, the executive office of the governor or lieutenant governor, or employees thereof."
• The judiciary. The catch-all for other bodies created or primarily funded by state or local authority excepts "the judiciary, including the office of the county clerk and its employees when acting in the capacity of clerk to the circuit court."

Michigan court records exist and are largely accessible, but you obtain them through court rules and the clerk's own procedures rather than by filing a FOIA request.

The 5 business day clock

MCL 15.235 requires that "a public body shall... respond to a request for a public record within 5 business days after the public body receives the request." A compliant response does one of four things: grants the request, denies it, grants it in part and denies it in part, or issues a notice extending the response period by not more than 10 business days. Only one extension is permitted per request.

Read that as a response deadline rather than a delivery deadline. A grant may arrive with a fee estimate and a deposit demand, and the actual production follows once the deposit is paid. A denial, in whole or in part, must identify the basis for withholding so that you can frame the appeal described below.

Fees: actual incremental cost, and nothing more

MCL 15.234 is unusually prescriptive, which works in requesters' favor because it gives you specific numbers to check an invoice against.

There is also a penalty built into the fee section, and it is the provision most requesters never invoke. Under MCL 15.234(9)(a), a public body that fails to respond in the time MCL 15.235(2) allows must reduce the labor charges otherwise permitted by 5 percent for each day it is late, up to a maximum reduction of 50 percent. The reduction is not automatic in every case; it applies if either of two conditions is met:

• The late response was willful and intentional; or
• The written request either conveyed a request for information within the first 250 words of the body of a letter, fax, email or email attachment, or included the words, characters or abbreviations for "freedom of information," "information," "FOIA," "copy," a recognizable misspelling of those, or an appropriate legal code reference for the act, on the front of an envelope or in the subject line of an email, letter or fax cover page.

The second condition is the practical one, because you control it when you write the request. Put "FOIA request" in your subject line and the trigger is satisfied without anyone having to prove the agency's state of mind. Where the reduction applies, MCL 15.234(9)(b) requires the public body to fully note the charge reduction on the detailed itemization the statute already requires, so it should be visible on the invoice. If a late response arrives with full labor charges and no noted reduction, that is a specific, checkable defect to raise.

Two waiver routes exist. The public body may conduct a search or furnish copies without charge or at a reduced charge if doing so is in the public interest, which is discretionary. Separately, the act requires waiver of the first $20.00 of the fee for an indigent individual who submits an affidavit of indigency, subject to limits including a maximum of twice per calendar year from the same public body and further eligibility conditions. That mandatory $20 waiver is narrow in amount but strong in character, because it is written as an obligation rather than a courtesy.

Michigan public bodies are also required to publish written FOIA procedures and guidelines and a fee itemization form. Asking for those documents first is a cheap way to see how a particular agency calculates before you commit to a large request.

How to file a Michigan FOIA request

1. Address the request to the public body's FOIA coordinator. Michigan builds the coordinator role into the statute, and MCL 15.233 measures the right of access from that person's receipt of your written request.
2. Put it in writing. Michigan defines "written request" broadly at MCL 15.232(m) to include a writing transmitted by facsimile, electronic mail or other electronic means, so email counts.
3. Include your name, address and contact information, unless you are proceeding under the indigency provision.
4. Describe the records sufficiently to enable the body to find them: subject, date range, department, and any incident, permit or case number.
5. Ask for the body's published FOIA procedures, guidelines and fee itemization form, and ask for a written estimate before authorizing work.
6. Diary the 5 business day date. A notice extending the period by up to 10 more business days is permitted once; a second extension is not.

Our free FOIA request generator will draft a Michigan-specific letter with the right citations, and nothing you type into it is stored or transmitted.

Denials, the internal appeal, and going to court

Michigan gives you a free administrative step before litigation, and two formal requirements decide whether it counts.

The internal appeal. You submit a written appeal to the head of the public body. The appeal must specifically contain the word "appeal" and must state the reasons for reversal. The head of the public body must respond within 10 business days, with one permitted extension of up to 10 additional business days. Those two drafting requirements are easy to satisfy and easy to overlook, and an appeal that omits the word "appeal" risks being treated as ordinary correspondence.

Court. Under MCL 15.240 you may file a civil action in the circuit court, or in the Court of Claims where the defendant is a state public body, within 180 days of the final denial. That 180-day window is shorter than many states allow, so calendar it when the denial arrives rather than when you finish negotiating.

What a win is worth. A prevailing requester may be awarded attorneys' fees and costs. Where the court finds the public body arbitrarily and capriciously violated the act by refusing or delaying disclosure, it may additionally assess a civil fine of $1,000 and punitive damages of $1,000.

Police records and body camera footage

The body-camera rules sit outside FOIA, in the Law Enforcement Body-Worn Camera Privacy Act, Act 85 of 2017.

MCL 780.313(2) provides that a recording made by a law enforcement officer with a body-worn camera that is recorded in a private place is exempt from disclosure under FOIA, subject to the exceptions in sections 4 and 5 of that act. Disclosure of body-camera recordings is also subject to crime victim protections under the Crime Victim's Rights Act.

Three practical points follow. The exemption is keyed to the private place, not to the camera, so footage recorded in public spaces is not covered by this provision even though other FOIA exemptions may still apply. The sections 4 and 5 exceptions are the mechanism by which private-place footage can still be released, and they were not independently verified for this page, so ask the agency to identify which one it is applying. And a person actually depicted in a recording generally stands in a different position than a member of the public, which is worth stating explicitly in your request if it applies to you.

Beyond body cameras, the general FOIA exemptions in section 13 of the act govern law enforcement investigating records, and an open investigation remains the most common reason a police records request in Michigan is denied or delayed.

What Michigan FOIA does not cover

Birth, death and marriage certificates are not FOIA records. They come from the Department of Health and Human Services Division of Vital Records and Health Statistics under separate eligibility rules tied to your relationship to the person named. See our Michigan death records guide.

Court files are not FOIA records either, because the judiciary is excluded from the definition of public body. Use the court clerk's own access procedures.

Federal agency records run under 5 U.S.C. 552. The federal statute shares Michigan's name but uses a 20-working-day clock, different fee categories and a different appeal structure: see our guide to filing a federal FOIA request.

Emergency call audio raises questions distinct from ordinary agency paperwork; we cover the general framework in Are 911 calls public records?.

Information on this page reflects Michigan law as of August 2026 and is general legal information, not legal advice. Agency fee schedules and FOIA procedures change. For advice on a specific denial or appeal, consult an attorney licensed in Michigan.