First Meeting of the New Year

Good morning everyone. Hope you all had a great first weekend of the new year!

This week we are also kicking off our Facebook group for those that are subscribed to this page. This will be an "Insiders" group and allows me to have direct communications with those in the group. It will not be all politics... I will be doing a bit of sharing local events and all of those things.

If you want to know how to join in the fun, you can do that here or use the "subscribe" button above at top of the page. I appreciate all the support.

Today, we are going to chat about the meeting tomorrow. Remember, my challenge to you all for this year it to get involved. I want to see more people active in local government, whether that is attending meetings, sending emails to commissioners or making phone calls. Hope to see some new faces at the meeting!

We were talking last week about the texting ordinance and how we have not heard of an update on it. As irony (yes I know its supposed to say "fate") would have it, it is back this week on the agenda for a vote. This is something I mentioned to the BOCC several months ago as needing to change. Glad it is back for a final vote.

Here it is.

You can read the entire thing at the link below. The redline is what they are changing compared to what is there now.

Here is the "juicy" stuff.

County-issued mobile devices are for official County business only.
County officials and employees may only send or receive emails and text
messages regarding County business on County email accounts and County-issued cell phones.

This means that they can text about county related business ONLY on their county device. Reading this portion tells me that they can no longer use personal devices for official business, unless of course they do not have a county device, as those are generally only for admin and commissioners.

This means your county commissioners can only text about county business on their county devices and can no longer use their personal devices for that. The county devices will have capture software installed to automatically capture the texts messages.

Again, this is to make sure these messages are captured for public record preservation. Doing it this way no longer burdens the commissioner with keeping texts when they are no longer in office for 5+ years... although they would need to ensure they are not deleting something that was not captured.

Then there is this.

In the event a County official or employee sends or receives an email
regarding County business on their personal email account or sends or
receives a non-transitory text message on their personal cell phone, the email or text message must be sent to their County email account within seventy-two (72) hours of the message being sent or received.

Staff and commissioners will now be required to forward all their texts messages FROM THEIR PERSONAL DEVICES to their county email accounts within 72 hours.

This is a HUGE win for transparency.

#1 - they can only use their county devices for these messages and emails

#2 - if they do not have a county device, but text/email about a county issue on a personal device, they must forward the conversation to their county email.

BOOM! That has been my goal since I started on this mission. This is how you get a transparent government. I will tell you this... some commissioners will NOT like this one bit. It creates more work for them and allows easier access into their conversations... don't like the rules, don't run for office.

Also, the simple solution is to stop texting with people if you do not want to do what is required for public record preservation under this regulation.

There is one thing that I am not a fan of.

County employees may opt out of receiving text messages on their County-
issued cellular device by generating a support ticket that must also be
approved by the user’s supervisor.

I can understand the admins not wanting to have texting option on their county devices. Citizens could be blowing up their phones all day. It also opens them up to unintentional problems that may arise from texting. However, that would mean they cannot text anyone regarding any county business at any time.

At the same time, those cell numbers are public record and anyone can get them. What stops a person from calling non-stop until they get an answer? Is that different than texting? County officials cannot block calls or emails from coming in, why should they be able to stop texts on devices tax payers are paying for?

I can see both sides of this discussion.

Key thing to note here... Commissioners CANNOT opt out of this. The text only references county employees. Commissioners are not county employees, although they are paid by the county's payroll system.

And they should not be able to opt out. Elected officials should be held to a higher standard. If they want to text, those conversations should be captured 100% of the time. We should not rely on them to turn in their text messages.

I might be surprised, but I presume there will be some discussion about this change. I am expecting some push back from a few of them. Some commissioners are not going to like the requirement that they have to use a county device for all conversation. Others will not like the requirement to send their texts within 72 hours.

I also suspect that this will lead to less texting and more phone calls... and thus... less transparency. But phone calls are public record too and while no one knows what is said on a call, too many calls to people, one can begin to speculate on what is being discussed.

Keep in mind that there is no "punishment" for commissioners violating this policy. It allows staff to be terminated for violations, but BOCC members cannot be fired. Perhaps they should address that and add "malfeasance" as the punishment, which allows it to go to the Governor.

In any case, it could be an interesting conversation to watch. One thing I caution them on... voting against this policy will be seen by the public that the BOCC does not want transparency when it comes to their text messaging... and questions of why will only grow louder.