City staff's private info sent out with water bills
OAKRIDGE, Ore. -- A list of the names and Social Security numbers of employees of the City of Oakridge was sent out with monthly water bills in this town of about 1,400 households.
Don Hadley is one of the residents who got a little more than he bargained for with his most recent water bill. In the same envelope was the City's newsletter that Hadley says contained too much information.
"It would be really concerning to me," he said.
Printed on one side of the publication is a news article and a January 2010 calendar. On the other side, the City of Oakridge Payment Calculation Report.
This includes private information about city employeees like their names, wage information, vacation days, sick time, and social security numbers.
"If it was me, there should be heads to roll!" said Hadley. "That's their social security number point blank right there across the front of the letter."
There's four names on the back of Hadley's newsletter. He says based on conversations with other residents, different employee names and information have appeared in other mailboxes around town.
"So that means every city worker in our town that works for our city - their social security numbers are floating around," he said. "So good luck folks."
City administrator Gordon Zimmerman originally told KVAL he's not sure how many people in this town of 1,400 got the mix-up in their bill. When we called him later for more information he did not return our calls. On Tuesday morning, he wrote a message explaining what happened to the City Council and KVAL News.
The mayor would not do an interview either. He told us this is not news, although most people we found were eager to weigh in on the issue.
"We have a great city council and a great city government," said Oakridge resident Annette Roy. "So ya it shocks me."
"I don't know how it happened," added Rob Deharpport, who saw one of the botched bills for himself. "But if my name was on there I would certainly find out. There's enough identify theft out there."
The mayor says several people have returned their letters to City Hall. Zimmerman says all city employees are being signed up for credit monitoring service.
As for Hadley, he plans to destroy his copy and urges others to do the same.
"I don't think anyone should get those social security numbers," he said. "That's wrong."
On Tuesday, Zimmerman sent the following message to the Oakridge City Council and KVAL News:
Council:
Sometimes technology can be your friend. Sometimes the print buffer in the copy machine can betray you. Yesterday, a local news source reported on an error made by City of Oakridge Staff concerning private information being sent to area households.
At the end of December, City Finance Staff was preparing the payroll for our employees. At the end of the payroll process the Payment Calculation Report is printed. In this case the report was sent from the Finance Office to the high volume printer just outside the office door. When the staff went to retrieve the report, they found that the machine was printing the monthly City Newsletter to be included in the mailing of the utility bills to our customers. Staff returned to their computer and cancelled the document in the print queue. Before that cancellation request was accomplished, some of the pages of the report were printed. Since the report is only eleven pages long, some number of pages less than that were printed.
The process of printed 1500 copies of the City Newsletter is a long one. It is done 100 pages at a time. To save the wear and tear on the duplex process of the printer, the newsletter is printed one side at a time. The 100 pages are taken out of the finish tray and replaced in the paper supply for the printing of the second side. The copies are then collected and stacked for processing. The utility bills, return envelope, and the City Newsletter are automatically folded and stuffed by machine into an envelope for mailing to the utility customers. The pages of the Payment Calculation Report were inadvertently printed on the opposite side of the front page of less than eleven of the 1,500 newsletters.
The utility bills were received after the long New Years Day weekend. During the first full week in January, four citizens who received the printed report called or returned the pages printed in error to City Hall. These people included a retired City worker, a former City employee, and a local office worker. One woman called and told City staff that she was destroying her copy. Only one person called the local media and not City Hall. The City has not received any other information about distributed personnel data.
All city employees were contacted as soon as the error was discovered. As a precaution the City is providing credit monitoring for all of the employees listed on the Payroll Calculation Report.
