Some Expensive Emails

By Kleinheider Posted on May 27, 2008 at 7:35 am

Drew Johnson of the Tennessee Center For Policy Research is once again knee deep in a controversy over open records requests:

Revenue officials gave Mr. Johnson a choice. Department employees could go through the e-mails themselves for free, or the state’s Office for Information Resources could do it at a cost of $3,201 for each day of correspondence, they said.

“The issue here, of course is that if someone has an embarrassing term … on their computer, they’re not going to just turn it over. They would delete the e-mail,” said Mr. Johnson, who heads up the Nashville-based anti-tax group. “The only way to have an external person check e-mails to ensure that every e-mail is actually turned over is through an electronic master tape.”

Sophie Moery, a spokeswoman for the Revenue Department, said the Office for Information Resources sets the price. She said officials made sure to offer Mr. Johnson the option of getting information for free.

“We certainly would not want to leave him with the only option of an expensive search,” she said.

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Tags: Department of Revenue, Drew Johnson, email, GQ Drew, open records, Tennessee Center For Policy Research  

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