DOT PARTIALLY DENIES REQUEST FOR CONFIDENTIAL TREATMENT
March 28, 2024
On February 16, 2024, DOT partially denied a request for confidential treatment concerning a company’s assets and financial wherewithal. The partial denial comes after 7 Air, LLC (“7 Air”) filed a Motion earlier this month asking that aircraft lease documents and financial information about Haines Capital Group (“HCG”), 7 Air’s primary source of financing, be afforded confidential treatment under 14 CFR § 302.12 (“Rule 12”). Citing Exemption 4 to the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”), 7 Air argued that both the aircraft lease documents and financial information about HCG were commercial in nature and involved sensitive financial information thus warranting confidential protection. While DOT granted confidential treatment for 7 Air’s aircraft lease documents related to two aircraft, it declined to grant confidential treatment to a letter from HCG responding to several DOT questions about the ownership and financial stability of the company.
The Department’s response hints at the limits of confidential treatment protection. DOT clarified that information is only “confidential” where the information is treated as private by its owner and provided to the government under an assurance of privacy. Since HCG is the primary financing source for 7 Air’s operations and previously received confidential treatment for the terms of its promissory note with 7 Air, DOT reasoned that any “financial information related to HCG is necessary for determining the financial fitness of 7 Air.” In other words, DOT declined to provide duplicative confidential treatment protection to 7 Air when the information at issue involved standard financial terms. DOT’s confidential treatment protection is more applicable when dealing with proprietary information like trade secrets. As such, DOT partially denied 7 Air’s requested Rule 12 motion and required the prompt filing of HCG’s financial information in the public docket.
If you have any questions, please contact Evelyn Sahr at 202.659.6622 or esahr@eckertseamans.com; Drew Derco at 202-659-6665 or dderco@eckertseamans.com; Jay Julien at 202.659.6648 or jjulien@eckertseamans.com, or any other attorney at Eckert Seamans with whom you have been working.
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