San Diego County supervisors voted unanimously Wednesday, Oct. 7, to direct staff to explore extending the county's email and text message retention policy from two years to five years.

Supervisor Joel Anderson proposed the change after a Voice of San Diego investigation revealed the county had automatically deleted whistleblower emails tied to a criminal case against a former county contractor. Under the current policy, emails not flagged as official records are purged after two years.

Text messages on county devices have no retention period at all.

"You can't have transparency if there's no history," Anderson said at the Oct. 7 meeting, which he attended by teleconference due to illness.

The deleted emails included two January 2023 exchanges in which a whistleblower warned county officials of problems at the Harm Reduction Coalition of San Diego, according to Voice of San Diego. Amy Knox, the nonprofit's former chief operating officer, was charged in February by the San Diego County District Attorney's Office with taking hundreds of thousands of dollars in public funds for personal expenses. A county lawyer told Voice of San Diego the whistleblower emails had not been tagged for preservation and were purged under the two-year policy, likely a year before prosecutors filed charges.

The board's directive gives the county's chief administrative officer 120 days to return with options for a new retention standard, along with cost estimates and potential funding sources. County Chief Information Officer Eric Shiotsugu told supervisors the change could cost millions of dollars annually, though he said more research is needed, Patch reported.

Supervisors Paloma Aguirre and Terra Lawson-Remer, the board chair, asked staff to detail costs and tradeoffs. Vice Chair Monica Montgomery Steppe questioned how broadly "documents" would be defined under a new policy. Lawson-Remer said transparency was important but the policy must be practical, adding she was not concerned about a staff member who may have "texted an emoji to somebody."

The San Diego County Board of Supervisors governs unincorporated areas including Rancho Santa Fe. A five-year retention schedule would match the city of San Diego's policy, which the city set in 2022.

Anderson helped lead a 2022 push that extended the county's retention period from 60 days to two years. He has said he regrets not pushing for a longer window at the time. Staff have 120 days from the Oct. 7 vote to return to the board with a proposal.