Fort Bend Herald
Bob Haenel - December 13th, 2005
Years ago, Fort Bend County County
Clerk Dianne Wilson came to Commissioners Court with a
proposal that would save the county money and space. At
least one of those is a key ingredient for any proposal.
The idea was to become a pilot program
by purchasing an imaging system that would allow every
document in Fort Bend County's records to be copied. That
system was purchased from a company that is now called Hart
InterCivic, which won the bid most recently to supply the
county with voting machines. Funny how these things work.
The name Hart should be familiar to
Fort Bend County taxpayers because we have had a long
association with the company, as has Wilson. Hart Graphics,
InterCivic's predecessor, was the company that used to
supply the old equipment used by the county clerk for
elections when she served as elections administrator.
The program to image records
eventually copied between 15 to 20 million documents on file
at the clerk's office.
At the start around 1993, the Internet
was a twinkle in everybody's eye. We didn't know how vast
its usage would become, and we are still grappling with its
impact - perhaps to a greater degree now in Fort Bend
County.
In the past three editions of the Fort
Bend Herald, we have examined Wilson's placement of all
those imaged county records on to the Internet. In fact,
Wilson has worked hard promoting the product and herself as
a leading proponent in the state of unchecked access to
records under her protection via the Internet.
But no one really recognized the full
impact of what that meant until people recently began
finding extremely personal data about themselves among those
imaged records. Imagine all that information in the wrong
hands.
Wilson has debated the topic before
the Texas Judicial Council, advocating her position of
providing citizens (and all others) with unlimited access to
Public Records - including matters such as probate filings -
that often include sensitive data such as
Social Security numbers,
checking account numbers and bank routing numbers.
The Texas Legislature and the Texas
Supreme Court continue to wrestle with the impact of records
on the Internet. The last recommendation I could find on
work done by the Texas Judicial Council for the
Supreme Court was in August 2004. The panel's recommendation
included a sensible proposal: implement a "Sensitive Data
Form" that would be available to only those with proper
clearances, but unavailable to the general public.
In the research included in this
report, most states follow or recommend a similar policy,
and yet, Texas still doesn't have these locked into place.
Wilson already has sold all the county
records in bulk to businesses that will prosper by flipping
them to anyone willing to pay. We won't get into the
squabble over whether we saved money or gave away the store.
That's another debate.
The recommendation from the Judicial
Council makes it clear the onus to fill out the Sensitive
Data Form, should it ever become policy or law, will fall on
citizens filing documents. Fair enough. At least they'll be
aware, and maybe thankful, that sensitive information will
not be made available to the world.
The report also makes it clear that
the spilled milk - in this case, the sensitive information -
would be a burdensome mess to clean up, and probably
wouldn't add any protection. Ironically, on Hart
InterCivic's web site, Wilson is treated like a darling
since she has been promoting the company's programs and
equipment.
She touts the imaging system's
security measures. But it was Wilson, and Wilson alone, who
decided to place these records on the Internet. She even
said so herself. There was no mandate from citizens to do
so.
Making Public Records easily
accessible to the public is one thing; making records that
include sensitive information available to the world without
any forethought is an outrage.
There were options that could have
provided more security, but it appears that in a rush to be
the leader - the expert - Wilson picked a direction that has
placed some of her constituents at risk.
As custodian of these records for
those citizens, she has betrayed them.
Bob Haenel may be reached by e-mail at
bobcoast@fbherald.com.
