We've finally received a response from the city as to why emails about Sam Adams wanting to take a private jet ride to Kansas City didn't show up when we did a public records request. You can read more about it in this week's news lede.

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ADAMS: OFFICE WANTED A PRIVATE JET FLIGHT TO KANSAS CITY, WAS TOLD IT WOULD BE 'INAPPROPRIATE' IN EMAILS THAT LATER WENT MISSING...

It turns out that while the Mercury requested the emails for September 22, 2008, the city only searched for emails for one minute on that date.

Hi Matt -

Just to close the loop, I spoke with Technology Services and learned the reason the email did not return on the first search. Though we had a specific date for the search criteria (Sept 22), when they instructed the program to search 9/22-9/22 instead of searching 12:00 AM-11:59 PM, it searched only the minute from 12:00 AM-12:01 AM. Lesson learned.

- Laurel

Laurel Butman, Principal Management Analyst
Business Operations, Office of Management & Finance


So: If you've lodged any public records requests with the city over the past decade or so, citing a specific date, you might want to try back a second time. Lesson learned!