Boston Email Blunders Extend Beyond Mayor’s Office

State public records law? What state public records law? Apparently Boston city leaders didn't get the memo ... or at least they didn't let old habits die when improper email deleting practices first came to light.

Last month, I wrote about a key member of Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino's staff, Chief Policy Adviser Michael J. Kineavy, deleting emails without regard for state public records laws. The issue came to light when the Boston Globe requested copies of Kineavy's emails over a six-month period, which only returned 18 results. This led to the revelation that Kineavy deleted all of his email on a daily basis, without letting them be backed up, in direct violation of Massachusetts public records law.

But the saga continues ...

It turns out that many employees at Boston City Hall were deleting emails regularly - it was a common and seemingly acceptable practice for mailbox management. The problem is state public records law requires the city to preserve "all city email" for two years. Even more surprising, the Boston Globe discovered that a state judge warned Mayor Menino's administration that city employees were deleting email nearly a year ago, but no one did anything to stop it.

Now, Kineavy's computer is undergoing a forensic review, and who knows if city employees are still deleting emails. But I bet Mayor Menino wishes he had a seamless email archiving solution in place right about now.