Sep. 5--A Dunmore councilwoman has admitted to having destroyed public records later requested by The Times-Tribune.

The newspaper filed an appeal to the state Office of Open Records after Melanie Naro failed to respond to a Right to Know request seeking the past six months of e-mail among council members regarding former Borough Manager Joseph Patchcoski.

"Ms. Naro states that it is her routine practice to destroy e-mails after 30 days. Is that in compliance with the borough's written retention and disposition schedule?" Dena Lefkowitz, senior attorney for the state Office of Open Records, wrote in an e-mail Sept. 4 to borough solicitor Thomas Cummings.

Melissa Melewsky, media law counsel for the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association, said there is no standard for public records retention regarding e-mail, but said the shortest retention time she has seen is six months. "Thirty days is certainly not appropriate," she said. "And for many public records, destruction is never appropriate."

The Times-Tribune filed the request with the borough Aug. 7. Mr. Cummings said every member of council was informed of the request within 24 hours of receiving the letter. Council was instructed to first send its e-mails to the borough, Mr. Cummings said, so he could review them for information that needed to be redacted, such as Social Security numbers.

Mr. Cummings responded to the e-mail portion of the request Aug. 14, saying all council members responded to the request with the exception of Ms. Naro.

Ms. Naro forwarded a string of four borough e-mails to The Times-Tribune on Aug. 14, with a note stating she was releasing them because they were also sent to Carol Scrimalli and Gene Ruddy, who will likely take seats on council in January.

Ms. Naro said Mr. Cummings and/or Mr. Patchcoski were copied on the other e-mails regarding the former borough manager.

"Anything that I sent, they have, Dunmore has," Ms. Naro said in a recent interview, adding, "I have no problem forwarding you what I did."

However, the e-mails from Ms. Naro were not included with the borough's official response to the Aug. 7 RTK request.

The Times-Tribune appealed to the state Office of Open Records on Aug. 26.

"If individual members (of council) respond piecemeal to RTK requests, it creates inconsistency," Ms. Melewsky said. "I think it's problematic, but I certainly do appreciate access was granted."

Council members had been using personal e-mail addresses to correspond with one another. However, within the past few weeks, they have received borough e-mail addresses, Mr. Cummings said. He has instructed officials to not destroy e-mails.

Barry Fox, Office of Open Records deputy director, said the agency will issue a final determination on the matter by Sept. 25.

Contact the writer: mreiter@timesshamrock.com

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