The Minnesota Department of Human Services plans to delete emails more than a year old starting next month unless its employees decide the messages contain official government records.
The change raises concern among advocates for government transparency and public records who worry it could dramatically limit the public’s understanding of the inner workings of the huge agency, the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported.
The newspaper said the new policy also underscores how state and local agencies often don’t treat emails as official records.
“Lawmakers talk a lot about transparency, but it doesn’t seem to be a priority,” said Don Gemberling, of the Minnesota Coalition on Government Information. “If we really care, as we say we do, about how things happen in government and the way they happen, then we can’t figure that out without access to email.”
Minnesota government officials acknowledge there is no uniform retention policy for email at state agencies. Asked about the change, the Department of Human Services said in a statement that it was “primarily intended to help improve the agency’s data protection protocols and ensure that sensitive data are safeguarded.”
The automatic email deletion policy will make it easier to manage inboxes that could otherwise be clogged with information, including private data, the statement said. Instead, official records will be kept in secure locations, including records subject to legal action, audit, data requests and grievances.
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