It was a major victory for government transparency and citizens’ right to know.
But while the City’s Information Technology Agency (ITA) tried to claim the policy change was made to help employees retrieve messages they exchanged during the recent wildfires, in truth it was the equivalent of a public admission of guilt.
Some 26,000 City employees have been given access to a Google Chat system that automatically deletes messages 24 hours after they’re sent. This means messages aren’t available to citizens as they should be per the 1968 California Public Records Act. (Even the City’s separate document retention policy, which dictates how long records are to be maintained, was likely violated.)
“The City unfortunately becomes motivated to follow the law when it’s threatened by a lawsuit.”
The use of the deleting messages system was revealed last year after Crane Boulevard Safety Coalition filed a lawsuit against Los Angeles challenging its approval of a planned home construction.
“The City of LA has a history of corruption and self-dealing, and this [practice] allows a platform for those deals to be facilitated without fear that anyone will find the evidence, because the chats are deleted within 24 hours,” Crane attorney Jamie T. Hall said. “The Public Records Act exists in order to ensure that there’s openness and transparency, and when records are deleted purposefully, it undermines democracy and facilitates corruption.”
Using their slippery system, LA employees could freely discuss everything from important city policies to lunch plans, without fear that their messages would become public knowledge.
In 2022, ITA warned City employees in a memo that, with Google Chat messages, “your conversation is not saved and will automatically delete after 24 hours.” On the other hand, if you’re using Google Chat Spaces with the “history” setting turned on, messages “will be discoverable,” the memo read.
Eduardo Magos, an assistant general manager for the ITA, confirmed to the LA Times, “Google Chat one-on-one and ad hoc group messages are automatically, and permanently, deleted after 24 hours.”
Well, there it is—the perfect hidden record defense. (If something no longer exists, you can’t be legally forced to produce it, can you? Mighty sneaky...)
As Sean McMorris, ethics and transparency expert for the nonprofit California Common Cause, said, the practice “could possibly be violating local and state laws.… State law is pretty clear on the public’s right to access most things that are relevant to the public’s business.”
But bureaucracies apparently thrive on secrecy and have an automatic impulse to prevent the public from discovering what they’re doing. That’s why the Church of Scientology is a strong defender of the people’s right to know under the Freedom of Information Act, following the words of Founder L. Ron Hubbard, who said, “Democracy depends exclusively on the informedness of individual citizens.”
If you can’t find out what your government is doing, how can you right its wrongs?
Los Angeles officials finally woke up to their shaky legal position when Crane threatened to file a lawsuit on the use of the automatic disappearing messages. It was no bluff and the City folded. (Let’s face it—they had no other choice.)
So how about walking the walk—instead of just talking the talk?
The Information Technology Agency said the City enabled the Google Chat “history” option “in response to user requests related to the citywide emergency,” and cautioned City employees in an email that their messages would now be “subject to production in legal proceedings, public records requests and internal investigations.”
In other words, watch what you’re saying, because citizens will now be able to retrieve those messages and read them any time they want, as required by law. (Want to bet the flow of messaging will come to a sudden halt?)
Jamie York of watchdog group Unrig LA isn’t buying the City tech agency’s explanation of why they turned off the Google Chat auto-delete option. “The City unfortunately becomes motivated to follow the law when it’s threatened by a lawsuit,” she said.
This, in spite of the fact that the records request page of the City of Los Angeles’ website claims the platform “is intended to facilitate public access to public records under the California Public Records Act (CPRA). Official records are held by City departments pursuant to governing document retention schedules.”
So how about walking the walk—instead of just talking the talk?
We’ve seen all this before. One of British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s advisors suggested that cabinet ministers use Post-it notes for communication, which would then be tossed out after use—just like LA’s disappearing messages—allowing staff to dodge Britain’s Freedom of Information Act.
Dr. David Morens, one-time adviser to Dr. Anthony Fauci, actually sent an email stating: “I learned from our FOIA lady here how to make emails disappear after I am FOIA’d, but before the search starts, so I think we are all safe.” He was promptly investigated by Congress.
Bureaucrats will apparently go to outrageous lengths to block information release to the citizens they claim to work for. Then, when caught, they’ll come up with ridiculously false public excuses for why they did it in the first place.
Given the many tricks governments use to avoid releasing information—no matter what the law demands—it’s up to citizens to stay alert, stay skeptical and insist on knowing what they don’t want you to know.
It’s your right.
