There are many minor factual errors in this article, so I do not want to leave the wrong impression.

I was fired because management feared that I would make the information public, although I did not do so. The information would have been used and later was used as supporting documentation to compile a report to supervision on a dangerous condition in our procedures.

There was no Healthcare-related Patient Information in the records that I accessed, although there could have been. The Communications Operations Section was part of the General Services Department, which was not a Hippa covered entity; although the Tucson Fire Department whom we serve is a covered entity.

My termination was upheld solely on the idea that I exceeded my job description by researching the problem and that I had not been given specific permission to access the records I was using as documentation of the problem. There was no specific rule and no order at the time that I accessed the records preventing me from doing so. The only rules cited in the decision to uphold the discharge was a general training on Hippa and the Information Security Policy of the City of Tucson (Administrative Directive 1.08-3) which says that employees should not access information not needed for their “job assignment.”

Again, there was no release of HPI nor even the information contained in the records except to management. My intention, until I was investigated for termination was to keep the information within the Communications Division and the memo was addressed to the Administrator. These were issues already addressed with immediate supervision before and after the implementation of the new system. So I was taking the next step in my chain of command.

I did relay other information to City of Tucson Council members who were being misinformed by management, and I did discuss the problems I was addressing with management to council members, who are the elected officials overseeing all City of Tucson government functions. My reports and the lack of action on these problems revealed mismanagement that rose to the level of wrongful conduct under the Administrative Directive 2.02-4, Reporting Wrongful Conduct.

The Civil Service Commission did not agree.