From Deseret News archives:

Rocky may have broken e-mail laws

Published: Thursday, Sept. 2, 2004 11:07 p.m. MDT
 |  E-MAIL | PRINT | FONT + - 
Mayoral e-mails that surfaced in a public meeting last week have some Salt Lake City Council members wondering if Mayor Rocky Anderson broke city laws — dealing with using city e-mail for personal use and campaigning during hours of employment — amid his 2003 re-election campaign.

In e-mails distributed to the City Council last week, Anderson used his mayoral e-mail to receive and pass campaign information with his campaign coordinator, Lindsey Shorthouse.

In one e-mail the mayor used his city e-mail to discuss the style of political advertisements with a private contractor paid by the mayor's campaign. In other correspondence between Shorthouse and Anderson, the pair discussed the price of such advertising. They also discussed how to coordinate a commercial spot with Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and additional campaign issues.

"What do you want to do with Mitt about where they want to shoot the commercial?" one e-mail from Shorthouse asks.

Rod Burkholz, of Bailey-Montague Graphic Design, and Anderson discuss the look of campaign advertising designed to be placed on the back of Yellow Cab taxis.

"Aura looks better, at least on the computer," Anderson wrote. "Can we see how this will actually look? We ought to get going on this, particularly with the taxi meeting this Saturday."

Story continues below
City Council Chairwoman Jill Remington Love — who supported Anderson's challenger Frank Pignanelli during the campaign — said the e-mails raised her eyebrows. Love instructed her staffers to see if the correspondence broke any city laws and they came back with a few sections of code that the e-mails apparently violate.

"Except for de mimimus personal use of city technology and equipment, the software and the data are to be used for bona fide purposes only," the city's information technology code reads. "It is inappropriate, under any circumstances, to use city technology and equipment for personal business."

Also city code states: "A municipal officer or employee may not engage in political campaigning . . . during hours of employment."

Love said she hopes e-mails were limited and didn't take away from the mayor's attention to city business.

"I certainly hope it wasn't excessive," she said.

Councilman Dave Buhler — who also supported Pignanelli — was also concerned about the communications and, like Love, hopes they weren't excessive.

"If he was consistently using city e-mail for campaign purposes it's a problem," Buhler said.

Anderson's spokeswoman Deeda Seed said there weren't many e-mails between Anderson's city address and the campaign.

Comments

You can be the first to comment on this story.

previousnext

Latest comments

Gifts for gamers

There are some games I love not on your list. Arkham Asylum for one.

Daughter: Mitchell fed me my pet

Our parents made my brothers help kill and clean our rabbits before we ate...

Why would you keep it open? I would understand if there was a lot of amazing...

The government will run our health care well? Read Reader's Digest, November...

BCS stable at top, Y. up to 14

TCU stomped on the MWC so they are naturally ready to crush Florida, Alabama...

Jazz win 6th in 7 games

could you understand Dave Locke any more than my mom does and she is not even...

Notre Dame fires Weis

Attending the ND/BYU game 3 years ago in south bend, a couple of things stuck...

I missed the game, actually i heard a little bit of Locke on the radio (man...

Hall's pain reflects self-betrayal

quotes were good: Article was dumb and unnecessary.

Understanding translation process

I believe the art depicting Joseph looking at the plates may possibly be...

Advertisements