A wide-ranging and often heated discussion Tuesday of how the county handles records requests saw one county supervisor leave the dais unexpectedly and the remaining board members direct the county staff to rethink records policies.
The possibility that one of Supervisor Ally Miller’s staff members created a sympathetic news website on county time led to a number of records requests from several media outlets over the last month, including the Arizona Daily Star.
The manner in which those requests have been responded to has raised questions about some of the public-records policies the county has in place, several supervisors said during their regular Tuesday meeting.
“I think what has become really very clear in this discussion is that our current policy stinks,” Supervisor Ramón Valadez said. “More importantly, it doesn’t work.”
Some of those requests had to do with emails and other information that may be on personal devices, like computers and cellphones. However, the county’s chief information officer, Jesse Rodriguez, told the board that his office is unable to track activity on such devices, as they are able to with county-owned equipment.
“Unless we had a court order we would not be able to ask the individual for access to their personal phones and equipment,” he added.
Thomas Weaver, deputy county attorney, said county business done on personal devices or email is subject to state records laws, though it is sometimes more challenging to retrieve that information and more so when that employee no longer works for the county. That is the case with the Miller staffer in question, Timothy DesJarlais, who resigned several weeks ago, Weaver pointed out.
Rodriguez said the county is taking “actions … to try and address this very issue,” including moving away from allowing employees to use their own devices to a “policy where if you have the need to have a cellphone, the county will provide you that cellphone and we will control all aspects of the use of that cellphone.” There is no such policy currently, he said in response to a question from Supervisor Sharon Bronson.
Robin Brigode, the board’s clerk, told the Star that Miller and some staff members told her they had not used private devices or email to do county business. Brigode also said that while the county doesn’t have a countywide policy regarding such practices, it does instruct all employees about what constitutes a public record.
However, the Tucson Sentinel’s Dylan Smith, who is also requesting records from Miller’s office, told the board that there were “piles of evidence” in records already released to him and others that personal emails were used.
In response to a question from Bronson about whether she would turn over records from her personal devices, Miller said she will “provide any records that are related to county business.”
Miller, who left the meeting abruptly shortly before noon for what she called an “urgent appointment,” did not respond to followup questions about the alleged use of private devices and emails in her office or the nature of her appointment.
There were a number of tense exchanges and pointed comments directed at Miller during the meeting, with Supervisor Ray Carroll at one point accusing Miller of lying and Miller earlier responding that she “will not be interrogated by Supervisor Carroll.”
Questions were also raised about the manner in which records released so far were redacted, work Brigode said was done by Miller’s office.
In his comments to the board, Smith said portions of emails and other records he received were “oddly, inconsistently and unjustifiably redacted,” and responses were “beyond any reasonable interpretation of prompt.”
Bronson said the county does not have “a very cohesive policy” when it comes to how redaction of records is done and who is responsible for doing it.
To address some of the issues brought up by recent records requests to Miller’s office and requests to come, Valadez proposed directing the staff to develop a “realistic policy” that clarifies time limits for requests and who redacts records, while also ensuring “timely, prompt and accurate” responses.
Additionally, the motion directed Brigode and her staff to redact materials from Miller’s office using criteria to be developed by the county staff this week, and quickly provide them to the outlets that requested them.
The measure passed 4-0 after Miller had left.
After the meeting, Brigode declined to say how much providing the records would cost the outlets, but said it would be “less” than the more-than $1,000 bill Miller recently sent to the Star and Sentinel.
