The Senate gave final approval Friday to a bill designed to make it easier to catchgovernment employees who use official email for political purposes.

It voted 25-0 to approve HB72, and sent it to Gov. Gary Herbert for his consideration.

The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Justin Fawson, R-North Ogden, earlier said that under current open records laws,agencies might be able to reject requests for such emails as personalcommunications even though activities they may reveal “are a violationof the law.”

He said the bill changes that to require disclosure personal communication of a political nature.

He said the bill changes that to require disclosure personal communication of a political nature.

Feb. 6: Bill advances to make it easier to catch government employees who use official email for politics

The House on Tuesday passed a bill designed to make it easier to catch government employees who use official email for political purposes.

It voted 68-0 to pass HB72, and sent it to the Senate for consideration.

Rep. Justin Fawson, R-North Ogden, said under current open records laws, agencies might be able to reject requests for such emails as personal communications even though activities they may reveal “are a violation of the law.”

He said the bill changes that to require disclosure personal communication of a political nature.

“This type of information has not been discovered even though it’s a violation of the law,” he said. “This just gives us a method to discover if the law has been violated.”

— Lee Davidson

Jan. 23: Using a government laptop or smartphone to play politics? If so, that’s a public record under proposed legislation

Using an office computer for a personal Google search or printing a non-work-related document on the clock generally goes unnoticed by employers.

But it definitely matters more if you’re a public employee or elected official using your work email to coordinate a political campaign.

A state legislator wants to discourage state and local government employees from using taxpayer resources for personal political communication.

Rep. Justin L. Fawson, R-North Ogden, is proposing a bill during the 2018 legislative session that would modify the definition of “record” in the Government Records Access and Management Act to include personal communication of a political nature, making such correspondence available to the public.

Fawson said there have been instances in the past where state employees have actively worked on a campaign while using things like their state email or state-issued computers.

“I’m not saying that they can’t use it for that purpose — even though I don’t think it should be used for that purpose,” Fawson said.

“I’m not interested in digging into anyone’s personal details, but I do feel like if you’re using state resources and having discussions of a political nature or coordinating campaigns of a political nature that should not qualify as a private conversation.”

He said that when he uses state resources, he considers all of his correspondence public information.

Fawson still has work ahead of him. The bill currently has no floor sponsor or Senate sponsor, and was held up for further consideration Tuesday at a House Government Operations Committee meeting.

Fawson said some agencies have expressed concern over his bill, but when he explains it, he hears the same thing — most people think that this type of communication is already public information.

Matthew Burbank, a political science professor at the University of Utah, said he had the same reaction to the bill. He said that when it comes to political work, he doesn’t see using state resources as a large problem for state employees.

“I think most state employees would be very cautious about using their office resources to do campaigning,” he said. “I think that most of them realize that’s probably a line they don’t want to cross.”

Burbank said obvious exceptions are legislators and the governor, whose jobs often blend working on legislation with campaigning to stay in office.

He also said the bill could either sail through the lawmaking process or sink — it’s hard to say in this early stage. It may be seen as a straightforward decision or an issue not worth spending time on during the 45-day session.

While the bill could be part of a larger push for greater public access to government information, Burbank said it is crafted narrowly to specifically stop public employees from misusing government resources.

“I’m not trying to shut down our First Amendment rights,” Fawson said. Employees would still be allowed to discuss political activities if the new law is enacted. The correspondence would just be considered public.

“I would encourage them to have this type of conversation over private resources, not state resources,” Fawson said.