You’ve got mail, governor: Daily News Editorial

     

As state attorney general, Andrew Cuomo saw for himself how helpful emails could be in exposing truth and bringing wrongdoers to justice. Incriminating emails written by stock analysts made Eliot Spitzer’s reputation as the sheriff of Wall Street. Scheming emails revealed the role of Gov. Christie’s aides in jamming traffic on the George Washington Bridge. Now, as governor, Cuomo wants to be rid of emails across the whole of state government with super speed. His aides say it’s just a matter of efficiency.

Of what kind, we ask.

The governor’s policy of having state agencies delete emails after just 90 days is a violation of the people’s right to know how officials handle government business — and a recipe for cover-ups. Cuomo must reverse the policy immediately. The government must preserve emails just as if they were old-fashioned letters on paper or printed memos. Those are not rapidly shredded. Emails should not be rapidly deleted.

The fact that the governor’s executive chamber began 90-day email purges in 2007 — before Cuomo took office — is no excuse. He made the call to extend the 90-day rule to all executive agencies, a decision made public in 2013 and now being fully implemented. Still more, emails are cheaper to store than paper records. The state’s email system allots 50 gigabytes of storage for each user — enough to hold 30 years’ worth of messages, according to the watchdog group Reinvent Albany.

While the governor’s aides insist the 90-day rule is commonplace in the private sector, it’s way out of line in the public sector. The federal government generally holds onto routine emails for as long as seven years. When the CIA recently proposed erasing emails of ex-employees after three years, the agency took heat for being too hasty.

The policy of the New York State Archives calls for retaining correspondence related to policy developments — a category that would cover a big chunk of state emails — for at least two years.

It doesn’t take a conspiracy theorist to wonder why Cuomo — knowing full well the power of email for holding government accountable — would move so aggressively to wipe it out.

What’s the hurry, governor?