Are Personal Emails of Wisconsin School District’s Employees Subject to the State's Open Records Law?
Neal Hutchens on Monday, September 7, 2009 at 9:36PM The Wisconsin Supreme Court has agreed to review a case dealing with whether the personal emails of employees of a school district sent using district email accounts and district-owned computers are subject to release under the state’s open records law, even if the emails did not in any way relate to the employee’s job duties. Oral arguments in Schill v. Wisconsin Rapids School District are scheduled to take place in November. The school district’s computer use policy permitted employees to use district email accounts for occasional personal use, and the district had not considered any of the individuals to be in violation of the usage policy. The citizen seeking the emails, describing the request as a “fishing expedition,” wanted them to assess if it appeared employees were abusing the district’s occasional use policy. Representing a question of first impression in Wisconsin, the case is of likely interest to observers in other states as well.
Reader Comments (1)
The Wisconsin Statutes make this case really difficult to figure out. Wisconsin's public records laws start with the premise that government be as "open" as possible, and then exceptions are defined. The statutes also ignore medium and focus on content.
So, at the foundation, communications which might be good for the public interest should be considered open. However, personal communications are specifically exempt when they are unrelated to one's capacity as a public employee. Which of these two categories do these emails fall within? If both, which wins (my guess would be the "open government" category).
I am not sure which way this one will fall, but most technology directors in Wisconsin (and I am one of them) is watching this one very carefully. The ramifications could be significant.
As a side note, the timing of these is really interesting. The original requestor sought emails from a period in March and into April - why this timeline? Is it possible that it was related to a contentious school board election (public employees may not use taxpayer resources to further the political agenda of any candidate or issue).
It is a interesting issue.