Prompted in part by the Beck v. Shelton case, and in part because of a massive FOIA request for more e-mails between Fredericksburg Mayor Bill Beck and some of his fellow council members, the Fredericksburg city clerk has begun archiving all of the council's electronic messages for easy access by the public.

During the course of Beck v. Shelton, plaintiff Patrick J. Timpone filed a FOIA request for copies of all electronic communication regarding city business sent or received since Jan. 1, 2003, by Acting City Manager Beverly Cameron, Beck and council members Scott Howson, Tom Fortune, Matt Kelly and Billy Withers.

Fredericksburg City Clerk Debbie Naggs toted some 5,000 printouts of every e-mail home to sort through and fufill the request. In the future, these messages will be sent to the city's electronic archive and catalogued by folder and name.

Some messages will not be archived. Messages unrelated to public business would not be sent to the archive: messages announcing someone's birthday or giving directions to a public function, for example.

Though the Fredericksburg e-mail repository will be the first of its kind statewide, the Public Records Act requires governmental entities to preserve paper or electronic copies of e-mails — those involving official records — for specific periods of time.

Freedom of Information Advisory Council member John Edwards has frequently asked the FOI council to set up a similar e-mail archiving system for all council business, but the council hasn't yet taken up his suggestion.