Interesting turn in public records request in Escambia Co.

[wrobert]

I understand. What if the County Commissioner were receiving many spam emails, eg- ads, and began marking the ads as "Spam," to be blocked by filters? If the Spam filter mistook legitimate business emails and filtered it to the SPAM file, the Commissioner would never see the email, and might actually think he or she is complying fully with the law, when he or she says that he or she did not receive any emails on the subject. I wonder how that would play out in Court. If it was never read because it is in the spam filter, therefore never getting into the "in-box," how is he or she to know to forward it in your request?

County system, they all do it the same way. If the message was getting caught in a spam filter none of them would get it.

 

[idlewind]

County system, they all do it the same way. If the message was getting caught in a spam filter none of them would get it.

Darn, thought Joe had you there for a moment.

 

[Smiling JOe]

So an individual cannot mark spam in their own mailbox? My email address from my company's email service allows each individual to set their own spam preferences. Is the County's so unique that it won't allow that?

 

[idlewind]

So an individual cannot mark spam in their own mailbox? My email address from my company's email service allows each individual to set their own spam preferences. Is the County's so unique that it won't allow that?

Robert, what say you about this?

 

[Smiling JOe]

I wonder how difficult it would be for someone who wanted to get someone thrown out of office, to go to a public computer, such as the library, and sign in using a Commissioner's first name, go to some kiddie porn sites, and subscribe to receive such things using the Commissioner's email address.

I know the good ole boy system is at work in County Gov't all over this Country, but it sure would be too easy to make an elected official look terrible, without much work.

 

[wrobert]

So an individual cannot mark spam in their own mailbox? My email address from my company's email service allows each individual to set their own spam preferences. Is the County's so unique that it won't allow that?

No way would you ever convince me that each and every mail that they received on an issue was marked as spam, and so what if it was. A public records request has no automatic exemption for spam, nor no automatic exemption for not knowing it was in your mailbox. If this is occurring they should be searching their spam folders also.

You are also working under the assumption that the commissioners are the ones getting the mail and reading it, which is not true. I know one of them has all the email printed out, writes a response, and has staff type the response back. Have no idea what the commissioner is going to do with the new Blackberry they were recently given.

I do admire you for standing your ground in their defense though.

 

[idlewind]

No way would you ever convince me that each and every mail that they received on an issue was marked as spam, and so what if it was. A public records request has no automatic exemption for spam, nor no automatic exemption for not knowing it was in your mailbox. If this is occurring they should be searching their spam folders also.

You are also working under the assumption that the commissioners are the ones getting the mail and reading it, which is not true. I know one of them has all the email printed out, writes a response, and has staff type the response back. Have no idea what the commissioner is going to do with the new Blackberry they were recently given.

I do admire you for standing your ground in their defense though.

I do not speak for Joe, but I am not defending anyone. I am defending the rights of everyone from unwarranted intrusion by the government into their personal affairs. If the government can examine commissioner's mail, then they can examine mine or yours if the "reason" is deemed good enough. We have already sacrificed too much personal liberty in this country.

 

[wrobert]

I do not speak for Joe, but I am not defending anyone. I am defending the rights of everyone from unwarranted intrusion by the government into their personal affairs. If the government can examine commissioner's mail, then they can examine mine or yours if the "reason" is deemed good enough. We have already sacrificed too much personal liberty in this country.

Maybe we need to get back on track here. Elected officials are aware of this being possible when running for office. So they can choose not to participate. The emails that are being examined are public records. They are on government email servers. When we spoke about private email addresses, I used the example to show how easy it is to catch someone trying to say that they did not get an official email at their private account. There are copies, and obviously this guy had them. He asked for all the emails, was told there were none, asked again, told that there were none, then asked one more time and asked that they make 'sure' that they were none as he would be going to court the next day to try to get them produced. Suddenly dozens showed up. For him to be so persistent, I believe that he had copies of the emails already, at least one side of the conversation, and felt confident that he could get the others. If the commissioner was so committed to privacy, they could have presented their case to the judge to see how it worked out.

Of course, Escambia County has actually jailed officials in the past for violation of the public records law, one school board member, and the DEP regional director for the area.

 

[Interested Girl]

I do not speak for Joe, but I am not defending anyone. I am defending the rights of everyone from unwarranted intrusion by the government into their personal affairs. If the government can examine commissioner's mail, then they can examine mine or yours if the "reason" is deemed good enough. We have already sacrificed too much personal liberty in this country.

Do you also defend someones right to have a volleball net on their property ?

 

[Smiling JOe]

Maybe we need to get back on track here. Elected officials are aware of this being possible when running for office. So they can choose not to participate. The emails that are being examined are public records. They are on government email servers. ....

I'm confused because I thought the issue was taking one's private computer and confiscating private emails, not public. If the emails were sent to the public email address for a Commissioner, they should be able to find it on the County's server, without need to take any computer from anyone.