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Home Front: Politix

EPA Employees Not ‘Intentionally' Breaking Law By Deleting Official Texts, IG Claims

2016-12-22

HT AOSHQ
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officials only archived 86 text messages out of 3.1 million agency employees sent and received in 2015, according to a federal watchdog's report made public Wednesday by House Committee on Science, Space and Technology Chairman Lamar Smith.

The EPA Office of Inspector General (IG) released the report requested by the Texas Republican, which described enormous text message retention problems within the EPA. One unnamed senior official configured his phone to automatically delete texts after 30 days.

The IG claimed EPA officials never "intentionally" violated the Federal Records Act and did not include the low number of archived texts in the body of its report, relaying it instead to congressional staff.
and just how was "unintentional" determined?

Posted by:Frank G

#8 ...er..same reason to stick a server in a hallway closet? To avoid FOIA requests.

Posted by: Procopius2k 2016-12-22 21:03

#7 I was under the impression that all government agencies had everything backed up to a secure backup in case of major disruption. If so things could be retrieved from the backup.

If not, why not.

Posted by: rjschwarz 2016-12-22 20:22

#6 Maybe we can ask the Russians for them. Heh(tm)

Posted by: Procopius2k 2016-12-22 17:39

#5 Now you injecting common sense into the conversation.

I work for a very large multinational corperation and we are bascally told two rules.

Dont put anything in email you would not want seen, out of context, on the front page of the New York Times the next morning.

Don't delete any emails. In fact emails are auto-archived by the system. You can't entirely delete emails without some extraordinary effort.

My guess is that the EPA intentionally does not auto archive for obvious reasons.

Posted by: CrazyFool 2016-12-22 12:39

#4 I'm of two minds with "Public Records".

I don't believe text messages that *individuals* send arise to the level of a "public record". I think that *mass* text messages (wherein an agency employee sends out a text to more than one employee) ARE "public records", and should be preserved as such by the sender.

Since one person texting another (in my view) doesn't arise to the level of a "public record", I also don't think it should shield anyone from wrongdoing. For example, an employee shouldn't be able to claim immunity from an action by asserting that his boss "texted me that it was ok to proceed". "Public records" should include the policy manuals for the given agency and all email correspondance (yes Hillary, even about yoga classes), but not singular trading of text messages between two individuals.

There should also be a clear understanding that "we" (the given agency) neither make nor interpret policy decisions by text message.

Posted by: Crusader 2016-12-22 12:20

#3 The FOIA is based on laws mandating archiving messages with penalties for noncompliance. This would be an excellent reason to start RIF'ing the deadwood atop the EPA -- Retire or be fired.

Posted by: magpie 2016-12-22 11:59

#2 Yeah... because that defense would work so well with the rest of us....

Posted by: DarthVader 2016-12-22 11:48

#1 ..I believe he is using Comey's definition of 'intent'. Seems to be a pattern.

On the other hand, misuse a word or term that might be misconstrued as racist or sexist, then there is no concern about 'intent' by this same crowd.

Posted by: Procopius2k 2016-12-22 11:30

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