Dearborn Heights council holds special meeting after youth-sports roster with minors' names and addresses appeared online

Dearborn Heights City Council met in a special session July 29 after parents and residents said a parks-and-recreation backup file listing children from the D7 Dads Club — including names and home addresses — was uploaded in an agenda packet and became publicly available online.

Parents, volunteers and council members at the meeting pressed city leaders for immediate notification of affected families, an independent investigation and a written policy to prevent future releases of sensitive information.

The meeting matters because the file reportedly included hundreds of names and addresses for minor children who take part in city-funded youth sports programs, raising safety and privacy concerns and prompting calls for legal notices, credit-monitoring offers and an external probe by state law enforcement.

Council opened a public discussion and heard more than a dozen residents and D7 parents in person and by Zoom. Parents said one family member discovered the file and alerted the clerk’s office, and they asked the city to follow Michigan’s data-breach rules and to apologize to the club.

“Because he knows those best practices, we immediately informed the clerk’s office so that it could be removed as quickly as possible,” parent Rachel Lapointe said, describing how she and another parent notified the clerk after finding the file online. City Clerk Lynn Sena described the city’s agenda workflow and said items are uploaded to CivicPlus by administrative “admins” and are considered ready for publication after the submitting admin and, where required, the mayor’s office approve them. Sena said the clerk’s office does not have authority to redact items submitted and approved by other administrators.

Council…