Scranton resident finds personnel files of city employees left out for recycling at City Hall

SCRANTON — After finding a box of confidential files left outside of City Hall for recycling, a resident found himself in some hot water, he told Scranton City Council this week.

During the public comment portion of council’s meeting Tuesday, Tom Coyne of Minooka told how on April 24 he noticed an open cardboard box filled with files containing employee personnel records and other documents placed with recycling bins and bags left outside in the rear of City Hall along Dix Court at Mulberry Street. He also explained his efforts to get city officials to take control of the box of records, which ended up placed back inside a locked City Hall that night.

In response to questions from The Times-Tribune to Mayor Paige Gebhardt Cognetti about the matter, city Communications Director Christopher Hughes released a statement Wednesday acknowledging a “lapse of protocols” resulted in an unnamed employee mistakenly putting outside for recycling a box of files that were supposed to get retained and stored.

Calling the situation a “possible data breach,” the statement said the city is seeking privacy breach insurance and will provide affected employees with resources related to this event; and that the city also is reviewing document retention policies and procedures and will deliver updated guidance and training to all employees.

“At this time, the city does not believe the records in question affect any current employees,” the statement said.

According to Coyne’s recounting of events:

n On April 24 while entering City Hall for the weekly council meeting that night, Coyne first noticed several recycling bins and bags of shredded paper left out along Dix Court and thought nothing of it.

n When leaving City Hall after the meeting, he again took notice of the recyclables but now saw that one box without a lid had “shred” scrawled on it and he could see that it contained various files.

“What was inside? Employee files containing names, addresses, phone numbers, birth dates, social security numbers,” as well as emergency contact numbers, a wage garnish from the city, contractor information, condemnation letters and court files, Coyne said.

n After unsuccessfully calling the DPW to try to get the items picked up, he drove to the police station and asked for an officer to go secure the files.

“It was decided, after I had a glance into the boxes, that we took the unshredded HR (human resources) files and put them back into City Hall, as the police officer opened the door,” Coyne said.

n Then, the next week, Coyne went to the April 30 council meeting and said the city’s Law Department served him right before that meeting with a demand letter. This letter told him he improperly accessed and photographed the confidential files without authorization, and demanded that he account for his actions, delete photographic images of that records he made and divulge whether he disseminated any of the information he saw in the box.

“The city’s law department has just admitted that I took pictures of confidential documents,” Coyne said. “These documents were left with the trash outside of City Hall in the (Dix) court itself. They’re open season. I did not touch any of the boxes until the police officer that I went to get from the police station came up here to secure it.”

n Coyne also identified himself as “AFG Media” during the start of his public remarks at the April 30 council meeting.

“Now the city wants to come in and wants from this media association all copies of documents, paperworks and assurances that I’ve deleted everything to cover their putting confidential personnel files out in the trash, unshredded. It’s a shame and it’s wrong,” Coyne said.

He did not mention during Tuesday’s council meeting that last week he also posted on YouTube a video that he took during the night of April 24 of the recyclables left out in Dix Court. The video did not show the files up close or any identifying information.

Some residents and council members at Tuesday’s meeting also questioned how the files came to be put outside with recycling.

“That’s a pretty serious situation, where you have people’s HR (human resources) files left out on the corner in boxes like that,” Councilman Bill King said.

Resident Marie Schumacher asked if there would be repercussions on employees regarding the matter, and resident Norma Jeffries added, “Something needs to be done.”

Councilman Mark McAndrew said, “Someone has to be held responsible for this. This isn’t a good one.”

Councilman Tom Schuster said council must find out “what actions have been taken to protect our employees’ identities since this incident has occurred.”

The city statement said the city was made aware of the possible data breach on April 25 and takes the matter very seriously.

“It is our understanding that a staff member whose job duties include removing trash and recycling from City Hall offices inadvertently removed boxes intended to be placed in storage per our document retention policy. Those documents, some of which included personnel records, among other city documentation, were then placed outside for recycling,” the statement said.

It continued: “Thereafter, we were made aware that a private citizen examined the contents of those boxes and photographed some of their contents. The city has engaged the citizen involved to secure any copies that exist of the records and will pursue other actions necessary in this regard. This was an unfortunate series of actions and events, including a lapse in protocols.”