PHILADELPHIA -
The privacy of hundreds upon hundreds of Philadelphia voters may have been violated this week, when piles of documents used in "Get Out The Vote" calls were left sitting on a Philly street corner.
A woman who identified herself only as "Eileen" showed us cell phone pictures of documents piled in, on and around a public trash can on Cottman avenue near Leon St. in the city's Mayfair section Wednesday morning.
They appeared to have been dumped there by workers at the nearby "Organizing for America" Obama campaign office.
"Piles and piles of files of un-shredded documentation of people- voters," said Eileen. "Their sex, their ages, their phone numbers, maps to their homes."
The documents did indeed include phone numbers, addresses, age and gender- along with information about what time of day the person could vote- noted by abbreviations for "early," "midday" and "afternoon"- suggesting they might normally be tied up and out of the house at other times.
I paid a visit to the 4000 block of Teesdale St. to let voters know their information was strewn all over the street.
"We're not even aware of that." Said one woman. "I mean, that's crazy!"
We showed another woman a listing that showed her fiance's name and age. "Yeah, 24/male. Yup. With our address. What if somebody, you know, just come to my house? That's not safe. I don't like it."
Our call to the Philadelphia office of Organizing for America went to voicemail, where a recording said the mailbox was full.
But we did find the city's Democratic party chairman- congressman Bob Brady- at a social security rally, and showed him the personal information we were given.
"There's no question, they should have shredded it," said Brady. "You know, any information you obtain for an election, they're never going to need it again. Obama's not going to run again. There's no more 'Obama for America.' They should have shredded it. Probably campaign workers, just in their haste or whatever, that did not do the diligent thing in shredding it."
It's worth noting that most of the information on the documents we were given is public- available to anyone who spends the time and effort to get it.
But this makes it easy for nosey people- or crooks- to find out the age and gender of the people living in a given home, and- with that ‘when do they vote' information- what time of day they may be away.
Cell phone documents show voter call sheets dumped in and around the trash, un-shredded.
