By Jen Metzger
Last month, Ulster County Comptroller March Gallagher issued a subpoena to my office. Comptroller Gallagher’s subpoena demanded that the County Executive’s office turn over all records of whistleblower phone calls over a four-year period and the details of a confidential personnel report.
The County’s labor counsel responded to Comptroller Gallagher’s subpoena with a letter explaining that the subpoena was improper under State law and the County Charter. The Comptroller is the chief auditing officer of the County; her authority does not include the right to demand personnel complaints and whistleblower records unrelated to the auditing of
financial books, records, and accounts. The generality and open-endedness of the demands was also concerning. The subpoena would have granted the Comptroller the right to trawl through years of non-financial communications and documents for no stated reason.
I believe I have a productive working relationship with Comptroller Gallagher, and my office has been far more responsive to her frequent document requests than any of my
predecessors. I am absolutely committed to transparency and openness, and I don’t believe it is appropriate for any branch of government to guard information from the public
unnecessarily. However, some types of records, like personnel files and whistleblower records, are necessarily confidential. If we want the County government to function properly
and safely, employees and...
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