“We believe Estus will use this information to compare against databases to reveal tax warrants, bankruptcies, divorces, traffic tickets, and any other thing that would embarrass state employees and state government,” Zearley added.

GASP…the media DARE to speak against state government?! Media intimidation of state employees is one thing, but using DOBs to find most of this information (a lot of which is public information to begin with) isn’t wrong. This makes OPEA and the representatives involved look foolish.

Interesting captcha in light of the subject: agrippa legal

The answers to your questions are “yes.” However, the question being addressed is whether all state employees birth dates should be a matter of public record. Although that would undoubtedly make finding some of the answers to your questions easier to find, it does not seem appropriate to release this information, just as it is inappropriate to release the Social Security Numbers of all employees. There are ways to find out this information without getting birth dates, even though it could be more difficult to confirm the information, it just takes a little more investigating. For some reason I don’t think the Oklahoman or its related entities would be willing to divulge this information either. Birth dates would seem to be among the class of information that can not be released from a public entity (e.g. home address, SSN, home telephone numbers, etc.). Disclosures of answers to your direct questions would seem to be more appropriate: i.e. Has John Doe been convicted of financial fraud?

However, just because Mr. Estus was trying to use all tools he thought available does not mean he is a bad guy in any way, it just seems to me to be a little beyond what is an appropriate release of information.

So in your “future of journalism” you must have the birth dates of all public employees to do your job? Mining the personal data of public employees is journalism?

And people who work for the state (which includes employees of OU, OU Health Sciences Center, OSU, etc.) don’t have a right to have their personal, identifying information kept private simply because they work for the state?

You say “I’ve seen state employees misspend thousands of dollars on their purchase cards on personal shopping sprees, I’ve seen DHS workers abuse the faith placed in them to protect the downtrodden, I’ve seen folks in higher ed forget whose money they are spending.” That’s great, but what does it have to do with having access to the birth dates of state employees? If you have someone’s birth date, does it mean they can’t “misspend thousands of dollars on their purchase cards on personal shopping sprees?”

This batch request for state employee information sounds like a witch hunt. The overwhelming majority of state employees are middle class folks with no power and no influence, who just do their job as best they can. That the Oklahoman wants to come after these people and expose them by using their personal information is offensive.

James, there has yet to be an example of dates of birth being used from public records for identity theft (if you know of such an example, please let me know). James, having access to employee data has been key to reporting such misdeeds.
Witch hunt? How is protecting the public’s right to know how their money is being used a witch hunt?
The Oklahoman, to my knowledge, has no intention of “going after” anybody. But does it want to tell readers how their tax dollars are being spent and how effectively such resources are used? You bet and I’ll never apologize for that.
And Brent, comparison to The Oklahoman’s employees doesn’t make sense – I’m not paid with taxpayer dollars. I work for a private company.

Yeah, a lot of people are thinking this is the big bad OKLAHOMAN kicking around state workers. Actually, it’s about open government and the public’s right to access information. I’m a public employee and I know, because I’m paid with tax dollars, that I really don’t have some of the same privacy rights as other individuals. You would be surprised by the number of public employees who think that transparent government stops when it comes to information about them (their paycheck, their employee ID number, their DOB). Looks like we need more education on the government side of things.

Thanks for posting this, Steve.

John Estus
02/06/1984

Nice touch.
And what a wonderful captcha for this: “embroil inadvertantly”

John, you just voluntarily released your birthdate, there is a HUGE difference there. Ask any state employee to voluntarily release their birthdates, I have no problem with that. However, to compel their release is a substantial difference and I think we can all agree with that.

Steve, just because an employee is paid with state funds does not mean all their personal information is public record. Again, courts have found that home addresses, SSNs, home telephone numbers, etc. are all protected. If the argument is that birthdates are not akin to those details, I am open to hear the argument, but I currently fall on the side that just because a person choses to work for the state not all of their personal information should be public record. These are not elected officials, but 99.9% are just staff level individuals whereby the potential harm in the release (identity fraud, misuse, etc.) outweighs the benefits in my opinion. Again, it is not as if this will halt investigations, it just requires extra steps to be taken.

Hmm…my CAPTCHA is “on devilish”…maybe someone is telling me something too.

Good discussion. For more background, check out my DataWatch blog post from last month:
http://blog.newsok.com/datawatch/2010/02/19/how-many-state-employees-are-sex-offenders/

Brent is right on in his comments.

The problem with this action by the Oklahoman is that it is a batch request for all state employees DOB data. Data that, if released, will be mined to see if anything comes up.

That doesn’t strike me as journalism. It strikes me as a lazy witch hunt to indiscriminately dig up dirt on state employees. If the Oklahoman has reason to believe that certain state employees have behaved illegally in the past, then the journalists at the Oklahoman should investigate those individuals and request those DOBs.

And Steve and John, your wise ass comments and the fact that you think the privacy of state citizens is so funny is probably the most sickening thing about this whole issue.

This sounds great if its just press outlets that are requesting. But ANYONE could request ANY batch of names and birth dates. DHS worker that just took a child out of the home, an undercover narcotics agent, a highway patrol officer that arrests a murder suspect..do those people not have a reasonable expectation of privacy and security?
I appreciate and want transparency in my government. However I have no idea what value the access to a birthdate holds for the press, but can see exceptional negative implications for the open access to the public. I’d like to hear a reason why the press needs the batch birthday records of every state employee. If it is truly for name comparrison – ie, John Doe at DHS shares a name with a convicted child molester – are they the same person scenario, then I’m sure John Doe would be glad to show proof that isnt him.

Mike, here’s the interesting tidbit getting lost in all this: this campaign by Rep. Terrill and the OPEA conveniently skips over the fact THEY themselves have acquired the very information they don’t want taxpayers to have access to. Think about that. Why should they get special access?

James, sorry to hear you think that my comment was somehow “wiseass.” James, I’m asking again: show me where identity theft has taken place due to dates of birth being available in private records.
If you got to be a part of one of these computer assisted projects, you would see there is nothing “lazy” about the work. My investigation into employees’ use of purchase cards (which involved dates of birth being available) took months of work.
And this whole use of the phrase “witch hunt” is a bit bizarre to me. Are you saying you don’t want anyone monitoring how tax dollars are spent? You don’t want to know if people with criminal records are being hired to work with kids in the foster care system? You don’t want to know if people with fraud in their past are directly overseeing the expenditure of money?
James, there are tens of thousands of state employees. Are you really suggesting that the state’s shrinking force of journalists go through one employee record at a time? I find it interesting the take you’ve got on accountability to taxpayers. I’ve not made any jokes in this discussion, nor has John. You simply didn’t like John putting out his date of birth. And that’s fine. But come on now…
“Witch hunt” makes for a good soundbite, but otherwise it’s unrelated to what’s being discussed here.

Again, of course we want to know if criminal acts are being committed. However, if we don’t know about them, that would seem to be more of an indictment of our state auditing department then journalists. Just as we could catch more criminals if we did away with the requirements for search warrants, Miranda rights, etc., those rules have been set up for a reason. It is not to stop the honest hardworking cop (or journalist), it is to stop the dishonest one, to limit the ability for misuse. For years I handled litigation matters for a finance company, and believe me there is and has been plenty of opportunity to cause mischief with just a person’s name and a birthdate. It has been the result of many a lawsuit and thousands of dollars in costs. Is it rare? Yes, but entirely possible if you know what you are doing and are so inclined.

If you want to create a separate post about the OPEA and Terrill’s ability to get information we can debate that too, but this item is about a specific request by a private individual/organization to obtain birthdates for an unknown or unreleased purpose. I truly feel sorry for the fact that the state of print journalism is such that only one person has to do the work of an entire department. However, that fact should never mean that all state employees must now be compelled to release personal information. That is an awfully slippery slope. And just because releasing the information would make a journalist’s job easier, it does not mean all state employee’s birthdates should be made available on a whim.

When I investigated the state purchase card system, most of the agencies where I found fraud hadn’t been audited in four years.

Steve: I’ll tell you what the good soundbite is, your title to this blog entry “What don’t they want you to know?” According to this inference, if someone doesn’t wnat their private information arbitrarily and freely released, then they must be hiding something sinister.

Looks like I may have found a good resource.

Fair argument James. But here’s the thing: why is it ok for Rep. Terrill and the OPEA to have this information and not for the resident of Oklahoma to have this information? Yes, I’m suggesting that the OPEA might be hoping to avoid scrutiny of state workers. And I won’t make any apologies on this.
Captcha on this comment: “success rattles”

Or maybe the OPEA primarily wants to protect the privacy of it’s membership. Wouldn’t the Oklahoma Press Association work to prevent breaches of journalists’ privacy? Or the Oklahoma Medical Association work to protect the privacy of physicians?

No James, we’re not state employees trusted with taxpayer money and resources. But if I were employed by a state agency doing public relations, yes, I would expect my date of birth to be available, and no, I would not consider that to be a breach of my privacy. I would expect that as a state employee I would be subject to more scrutiny than those in the private sector.
I would be more bothered by my information going to a politician or a union than to a news organization.

“I would be more bothered by my information going to a politician or a union than to a news organization.”

Maybe in theory, but not when that news organization is the Oklahoman. The Oklahoman is the largest, most aggressive political animal in the state.

“Why is it ok for Rep. Terrill and the OPEA to have this information and not for the resident of Oklahoma to have this information? Yes, I’m suggesting that the OPEA might be hoping to avoid scrutiny of state workers.” Wouldn’t they avoid the scrutiny of state workers as to their own actions by not bringing this up at all? All this does is bring the issue under additional scrutiny regarding their actions too. In any event, well played in turning the spotlight onto another organization for which you have a stronger argument (but this doesn’t change the underlying issue). I doff my cap to you good sir. Well played indeed.

In any event, I don’t think anyone is saying that state employees should be exempt from public scrutiny at all here. Although you may expect your birthdate to be available to everyone in the public if you personally worked for the state (perhaps along with your home address and telephone number), I doubt if that is a unanimous feeling among all our state workers. The issues are: 1. If it is impermissible to release home addresses, SSNs, home telephone numbers of state employees…is a state employee’s date of birth such that it is analogous to information that is impermissible to be released. 2. Does the potential harm in releasing this information outweigh the benefits? 3. Is “freedom of the press” inhibited by withholding this information, i.e. is the press unable to prosecute its often Constitutionally protected function by the absence of this information?

It’s pretty hard to stomach the complaints about “batch” release over and over. As journalists, we regularly ask for “batch” release of employees’ names, their salaries, their agencies, etc. This co-called “batch” thing that OPEA is throwing around is really means they don’t want you to be able to do systemic looks at the operations of government.

Over and over, other newspapers have used this so-called “batch” release to show overwhelming failures by agencies to conduct proper background checks. In Texas, it’s shown that the state allowed felons to work with incarcerated juveniles. The Dallas Morning News showed those people were twice as likely to have abused inmates in a scandal that grew out of guards sexually abusing their child inmates. So that’s not important?

Those of you who say it isn’t important to journalism: If that’s the case, why is The Dallas Morning News spending money on legal bills that would make your eyes pop down here in Texas on the same matter? It’s because it’s absolutely crucial to being able to do good journalism.

Don’t you guys think it’s odd that, if this is such a problem, politicians aren’t moving to suppress personal information in voter rolls? Voter rolls have far more information available (home addresses, for example).

Throughout the entire court case, the people who want to suppress the dates of birth have been unable to cite *one* single person whose identity was stolen. There’s not a single study out there highlighting dates of birth as key to identity theft. Someone is attempting to legislate a problem that doesn’t exist out of fear, a fear that an Austin appeals judge called “speculative and unproven.”

By the way, you need a name to commit identity theft. Are we going to start arguing that government shouldn’t release the names of public employees?

[...] Steve Lackmeyer, earlier this week: I’ve been at The Oklahoman for 20 years. I’ve seen elected officials bought and paid for, I’ve seen state employees misspend thousands of dollars on their purchase cards on personal shopping sprees, I’ve seen DHS workers abuse the faith placed in them to protect the downtrodden, I’ve seen folks in higher ed forget whose money they are spending. [...]