It's surprising to me that a conservative organization such as the Greater Fresno Area Chamber of Commerce wants political candidates to give them sensitive personal information. You'd think that members of the chamber, of all people, would respect the personal freedom of the candidates to say that such a request is an invasion of their privacy.
But chamber officials say they need the Social Security and driver's license numbers of the candidates so they can do background checks before offering their candidate endorsements in the June primary election. Nothing wrong with investigating candidates you might support, but you don't need the Social Security and driver's license numbers to do a thorough check. The information the chamber needs is in the public domain and easily accessible through the Internet. Click here for The Bee's editorial on this subject.
All this came to light when Fresno County supervisorial candidate Debbie Poochigian refused to hand over her information, saying it could lead to her family being a victim of identity theft. Her opponent, Nathan Magsig, said he had nothing to hide and complied. Then Magsig tried to make political points out of the issue, claiming that Poochigian was trying to avoid public scrutiny.
Magsig may have jumped the gun on this issue. At the very least he's just plain wrong about a fundamental privacy question. But he'd fit right in with this county government and its naive view of ID theft. The Fresno County Board of Supervisors has ignored major problems in the county when bureaucrats have lost personal information of those dealing with the county. It seems that Magsig is joining with the board members who don't think ID theft is a big deal.
Look at the county record:
-- Fresno County health officials say 279 birth certificate applications that list personal information of Valley babies and their parents are missing after they were mailed to the state. An envelope containing the birth certificate applications arrived at the state Department of Public Health in Sacramento damaged, but with most of the forms missing.
-- In February, county officials warned thousands of CalWORKs clients that they could be victimized after a laptop computer was stolen. The computer was taken from a county office but belonged to Supportive Services Inc., a nonprofit agency.
-- Last May, a computer disk with personal information from thousands of home health-care workers was lost on its way to a company in San Jose.
But you haven't heard a peep out of the five county supervisors on this issue. You'd think they'd at least investigate the problem and try to prevent it from happening again. Now we have a candidate running for a seat who has the same head-in-the-sand attitude about identity theft and protecting county records.
It's shameful. You'd think others in the community would learn from this mishandling of personal information. But not the chamber.
I think there's another point here about collecting data that is disturbing: How do we know the information gleaned by using Social Security and driver's license numbers will not be used against those candidates the Chamber PAC did not endorse?
In other words, by signing the note that they have been made aware the information may go 'public' may actually mean candidates may not contest the fact they'll see their own private information used against them at a later date...not just that their Social Security and driver's license numbers would be released.
I had not even considered such a possiblity until the Bee story came to light this week and now I am wondering if that is the real reason they ask candidates for the information and to sign a release.
I hope it's not that sinister, but I can picture the Chamber PAC endorsing Candidate X and now they have a nice 'opposition research' file already completed on Candidates Y and Z that they did not endorse....and Y and Z helped them build up the file! If there is even a hint that Chamber fingerprints are on any future 'negative ads' in any races I will be curious to see if the information in those ads was gleaned from these background searches. I hope that won't be the case.
More importantly, I think Al Smith's response to all this has been unsettling. The better response when a reporter calls on something like this might be to say:
"While the Chamber has asked candidates for this information for years, in this day and age we should have been more sensitive to issues like identity theft and not put candidates in this predicament. Candidates are not guilty until proven innocent and our process will be changed in the future to show our respect and trust of those running for high office. Like any organization that endorses we do not want to be unpleasantly surprised after giving support to a candidate, but we have learned from this incident and will come up with reasonable alternatives in the future that protect both our needs and those of the candidates. I apologize to the citizens of Fresno and the candidates for any harm done here and want to assure the citizens that their Chamber is an organization they can trust from top to bottom."
Maybe Nathan has Lifelock.I met Debbie...not very impressive.She spoke but was very vague with the same old rhetoric.Waiting to meet and hear what Nate has to say.David's blog makes the COC sound like Clinton Inc.
Identity theft is an ever increasing problem, yet as a nation we must get more and more data on folks. Indeed, I have advocated a national ID card to deal with some of these problems, like immigration. A partial solution is a massive increase in the penalties for ID theft, even, or more especially including government employees like those looking at candidates passport files. We can make thieves, or even voyeurs, think twice if they face serious jail time before they abuse identity.
As the staff member that coordinates the background checks for all of the ChamberPAC candidates, I would like to clarify a few misconceptions about our process which have been shamefully misrepresented.
To clarify, when the candidate recieves the packet to submit their background information, the form they sign specifically states that we use a professional background company to perform the search and the results are given directly to our PAC chair, no one else, not even staff. Once the results have been given, UNLESS there is something controversial that may sway the PAC's decision, the information is destroyed. That means that only IF there is something controversial, the PAC is notified of the results. Hence the word, "notified," the PAC members do not ever see the actual forms the candidate fills out with their social security number and drivers license number, they are just notified of false results by the PAC chair. That is our policy.
So long as the candidate has a clear background, which they should if they are running for public office, none of the candidates information is distributed to the PAC members, much less the public.
Therefore, what the candidate signs is actually a note of privacy stating that none of the information will be released. It is our policy that we are not allowed to use that information for future purposes and respect the right of privacy of potential "endorsees."
Amy, you didn't clarify what happens to the actual forms. I don't think any of the candidates are worried about the results - it's the confidential information on the forms that are of concern. You say the PAC members don't see them, but who does? Are any copies made or kept? If it's so secure, why do they have to release the PAC from any liability for improper disclosure?
We voters keep grumbling about the lack of qualified candidates running for office. So why do we make the ones that do give up all their rights and jump through so many hoops?
Ms. Huerta writes:
“Once the results have been given, UNLESS there is something controversial that may sway the PAC's decision, the information is destroyed. That means that only IF there is something controversial, the PAC is notified of the results.”
This is, of course, what you hope will happen. In real life people get information and use it as they see fit—especially within an organization that is political. Also, who decides what is “controversial” and if this information gets released?
She also writes:
“Therefore, what the candidate signs is actually a note of privacy stating that none of the information will be released. It is our policy that we are not allowed to use that information for future purposes and respect the right of privacy of potential "endorsees."
I believe you and your organization cannot guarantee the candidates’ information will remain private so you should not ask for it. The only thing shameful I see is the politically motivated Chamber trying to dig up dirt.
Re Amy Huerta's comments: Once again we're confronted with the "If they don't have anything to hide, everything will be fine" line of reasoning that Nathan Magsig was so quick to spout, cliche-style. As one of my fellow commenters pointed out, who is to decide what is "controversial"? The potential for a political special-interest group -- and that's what the Chamber is -- to misuse such information is too great. A short course in civil liberties should be required of her and everyone in the Chamber. Her note of explanation is actually more damning than what was contained in the original news story. Jim Boren's original contention that the Chamber is unbelievably tone deaf on this subject is actually strengthened by Huerta's comments.
As the 2008 Chair of the Chamber PAC I would like to respond. The Chamber only pursues background checks of potential candidates to be sure there is nothing which would make them decide the candidate should not be endorsed. The form they sign is sent to the investigation company and nothing is kept at the Chamber. The report, which does NOT contain the sensitive identification materials is sent to the PAC chair as a confidential communication. So long as there is nothing which must be shared with other PAC members, the chair shreds the reports.
This is the first time anyone has objected. When it occurred, we checked with the investigation company and we were told that in most instances, a driver's license is sufficient. We told that person we would only need the driver's license, but that was not good enough for her--so she did not show up to be interviewed.
Being certain about a person we support as a candidate is important. We take extraordinary methods to protect the information and only use it to determinate if our endorsement is appropriate.
Because of the raising of this issue, for the first time in years and by one person, we are considering if it would work as well to have the information needed sent directly to the investigation company. We may do that in the future.
BUT--let's put this in perspective! We give our driver's license numbers to checkers at the supermarket. I understand if it is not going to a credible source, but that is not the case here. You give your social security number to your bank---where many employees may have access to the information. Sometimes it is necessary to give out the information, and frankly this is a low risk situation.
We will attempt to do whatever is possible to protect the personal identification materials, but we will continue our background checks on potential candidates. We owe that to the voters who consider our endorsements significant.
For the record, we give our SSN to our bank because it's required by law (for tax purposes), as I'm sure Ms. Salisch must know. I don't give my driver's license number to store checkers. Maybe people who write checks do, but that's their choice. I may have to show my DL for identification if I use a credit card, but nobody is writing down the number.
I happen to live in District 5. If the CoC endorses one candidate because the other didn't want to jump through unnecessary procedural hoops, that's their right I suppose. But their endorsement will mean nothing to me as a voter.
Ms. Amy Huerta, the PAC’s coordinator for these background checks, says their process has been “shamefully misrepresented”. She also says the “what the candidate signs is actually a note of privacy stating that none of the information will be released."
I won’t accuse anyone of “shameful misrepresentation”. But I will detail what the document actually says.
The Notice, Authorization, and Release that the candidate is required to sign states: “I also release FRESNO CHAMBER PAC, its Board Members and agents from all liability arising from the public disclosure of any information obtained by the FRESNO CHAMBER PAC from the above background report. While FRESNO CHAMBER PAC is not seeking permission to release any information obtained in the background report, I agree that a disclosure may occur without liability to FRESNO CHAMBER PAC.”
My interpretation is that all of the background information can be released without liability to the PAC. There is no “note of privacy stating that none of the information will be released”. If the Chamber is so confident in their procedures for proper handling of identity theft materials, if Ms. Salish is so confident that this is a "low risk situation", why the need for the release of liability?
Is the Bee looking out for us and the poiticos or is it just an oppurtunity to take a swipe at someone/something that doesn't lean in their direction.It's their M.O.
Why don't we just deputize the chamber? ...make them a de facto law enforcement wing. Al Smith obviously needs more power.
That's it, Brian: When all else fails (including logic), blame the messenger. How about slamming the Chamber for a problematic policy rather than The Bee for publicizing a candidate's concerns? Talk about a knee-jerk reaction.
D.im W.it,Is my assertion too far fetched? The Bee picks and chooses their drivel and then feed it to us through their ever expanding media channels.The info the C.O.C. wants has probably been given out over and over on anything from a cleared check to a credit application. The horse is out of the barn on personal info and if you don't have the necessary protection then your probably not smart enough to be supervisor.