CBE EXPENSE REPORTING RAISES FEARS OVER PRIVACY
In an effort to be more transparent by publishing trustee travel expense receipts for the past year, the city’s public school board has stumbled into a big privacy pothole.
The personal information of several Calgary Board of Education elected officials landed online Tuesday, contained in expense receipts that were published that afternoon.
In one case, trustee Carol Bazinet’s recently cancelled credit card number was available, and could be read through the blue pen used to scratch it out.
In another case, the personal e-mail address, cellphone number and Aeroplan number of trustee Sheila Taylor’s husband was not redacted.
Problems with one trustee’s expenses were first noticed Tuesday evening, and fixed, but by Wednesday morning officials were getting more complaints.
The reports were soon pulled from the web, and Alberta’s Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner was notified by the CBE of the breach.
Board spokesman Richard Peter acknowledged policy and practice need to be improved as the CBE moves to publish greater expense details.
Taylor, like several trustees, flew to Boston in April for a National School Boards Association conference.
Taylor said her husband accompanied her (he paid his own way), and his information appeared in their flight itinerary that was posted Tuesday on the CBE website.
Part of the problem, Taylor said, is the receipts were posted in haste without proper policy.
It’s something she had urged at a public meeting last month when she pushed for a greater disclosure of expenses.
Fellow trustees, however, voted against discussing the question at that meeting.
“What happened instead of doing it in the boardroom was this work was done in the backroom,” Taylor said.
Bazinet’s credit card information was contained on a receipt for a $40 cab ride in Edmonton.
And she said her cell number appeared on another record, even though she didn’t put it there.
“Any taxpayers dollars that were spent on my behalf, I want the public to know that,” Bazinet said.
“However, personal information that’s not Calgary Board of Education information, that’s my personal information, has to be removed before that information is shared with the public. I know it wasn’t.”
The office of privacy commissioner Jill Clayton would not say if it is investigating, but did warn that organizations need to be careful what personal information they disclose.
“The commissioner encourages and supports proactive disclosure,” said Cindy Walker-Watson, the assistant to the commissioner.
“But before proactively releasing information, public bodies and organizations have to be mindful of the privacy implications, and that includes ensuring that personal private information is not inadvertently disclosed,”
Last month, the CBE moved quickly to promise greater expense disclosure after the province announced it would be publishing expense details for its politicians and senior bureaucrats.
On Monday, CBE chairwoman Pat Cochrane said trustee receipts would go up the next day, saying it wasn’t a complicated process.