Harford County officials will need written consent from County Council members to access members’ emails, according to a new agreement among the council, the county government, and the Department of Information and Communication Technology.

Before the agreement, passed by the council Tuesday night, the county government had unfettered access to council members’ emails with no obligation to inform members that their emails were viewed.

Council Attorney Meaghan Alegi explained before the vote Tuesday that members’ emails are accessed primarily when public information requests are submitted to the county.

When the county receives a public information request involving council emails, the county’s IT department conducts a computer search to identify member emails with keywords that match the request. Those emails are then flagged, indicating the email is potentially subject to disclosure under state law.

In the new agreement, the county’s IT department would not be allowed to view the flagged material and would be obligated to forward the flagged emails to the council’s attorney, who will then review the material with the member in question.

The member would review the request and then decide whether to grant access to their email. Alegi or the council administrator would then relay the decision back to the county — serving as the “single point of contact” outlined in the agreement.

However, regardless of whether the member grants the county access, members will have no way of knowing if or when the county accessed emails since their emails are serviced by the county’s Department of Information and Communication Technology.

“Without the council having $5 million to secure our own IT server, we will have no way of knowing whether or not they are accessing,” Alegi said. “Now at least we have a signed document that says they cannot do it without your permission.”

Alegi noted that if the county does violate the agreement and is caught accessing council emails without member consent, the council could pursue litigation.

Council member email access became a controversial topic in 2023 when former member Aaron Penman — who serves as a sergeant in the Harford County Sheriff’s Office — accused County Executive Bob Cassilly of “wiretapping.”

The accusations started after Penman accused Cassilly’s administration of misappropriating money from the general fund to the county’s emergency services department before the transfer was approved by a council vote in May 2023.

The county’s director of communication then reviewed servers for communications among Penman, Harford County Sheriff Jeff Gahler, the sheriff’s office’s director of legal affairs and former county attorney, Melissa Lambert, the sheriff’s office’s director of legislative affairs, Erik Robey, and Bel Air attorney Joe Snee, of the firm Snee, Lutche & Helmlinger PA, Cassilly’s office said in a news release.

Harford County State’s Attorney Alison Healey referred the matter to the Office of the State Prosecutor after reviewing Penman’s complaint and the results of the sheriff’s officer’s investigation.

The Cassilly administration maintained that it was within its rights to monitor communications on county-issued phones and servers and did nothing illegal.

In late December, Cassilly’s administration was found to have violated state public information request law after officials declined to view internal emails. Cassilly said the county was still waiting for a ruling in the 2023 matter and did not want to be referred to the state prosecutor again, so his administration waited to be told whether they could view internal emails.

The court ruling that deemed Cassilly in violation of state public record law told them they could access emails, Cassilly said, but he is glad to now have a formalized process for handling these types of requests.

“He respects the separation of powers and has no interest in accessing council members’ emails except as required by state law to respond to public requests,” said the county’s public information officer, Matt Button. “We appreciate the County Council’s cooperation and their working with us to formalize this process.”

Councilman James Reilly, who cast the only dissenting vote against the agreement’s passage, expressed concern with the agreement and asked Alegi what would happen if members denied the county access to their emails.

Alegi said the instances would be looked at on a “case-by-case basis,” to which Reilly said he “would not be in favor of that at all.”

“The other option is there is no limit and they will have unfettered access without telling us at all,” Alegi responded.

Council President Patrick Vincenti also addressed Reilly’s concerns by explaining that the agreement is a fix to an issue that does not require the council to spend an “absorbent amount of taxpayer dollars” since the alternative fix would be for the council to invest $5 million into its own IT department with servers and technicians.

Vice President Tony Giangiordano said the council consulted with numerous IT companies and confirmed that cost was the main issue, along with the logistics of the council starting its own IT department.

“We could put in the MOU [memorandum of understanding], ‘Call Tony Giangiordano if you want to get into his emails,’” Reilly said. “It doesn’t cost anything except six or seven phone calls, so this $5 million is nothing but a ruse.”

Before the council voted to approve the agreement, Reilly said he wished the council “would get a backbone and say no,” and then voted “absolutely not” while the remaining six council members voted in favor of the agreement — ultimately approving it.

“Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good,” Councilman Jacob Bennett said. “This might not be everything you hoped to have in the agreement, but it puts us in a better place than we were yesterday and it can always be revisited.”

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