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

Where in recorded history - anywhere - has a government based on dogma and...

Nobody cares about soccer. Will RSL please reimburse the Utah taxpayers now?

Same old story for Jazz

Maynor Miles Matthews Koufos Fesenko Milsap If I were the coach these...

If only! Beating BSU is unlikely, but look at the other upsets this year. If...

Ute fans are hanging their hats on "we scored more points than BYU, so...

Examples of effective summits please?

Aggies beat Spartans in snowy Logan

Why not make a trip to Romney stadium on Friday and cheer the locals "AGGIES"...

Letters: Sodom and Gomorrah

It used to be that some people were bigots. Today,as many of thexe postings...

and Utah's pathetic defense gave up 55 to TCU, and it could have been worse ...

TCU creams U.

I am a Utah fan and my hope is that we will get to the point where our...

Advertisements
Advertisement