Someone used the government e-mail addresses of County Executive Chris Collins and Comptroller Mark C. Poloncarz to circulate a message Monday, and it wasn’t Collins or Poloncarz.

A mystery sender, familiar with the county’s inner workings, wanted influential state legislators, financial analysts and others to read an editorial in that morning’s edition of The Buffalo News.

The piece had not been welcomed by Collins or Poloncarz. It sided with the state-appointed Erie County Fiscal Stability Authority in its ongoing dispute with Collins, Poloncarz and the County Legislature.

The e-mail confused recipients. Why would Collins or Poloncarz crow about an editorial that took an opposing view by sending around the link to the newspaper’s Web site?

“Don’t hurt taxpayers,” said the headline over the editorial, which argued that lawmakers in Albany should not weaken the control board’s powers as Collins, Poloncarz and the County Legislature have asked.

Collins’ office has urged the Sheriff’s Office to investigate. Poloncarz favors the inquiry.

“I’m angry, to put it mildly,” he said, “especially when considering that these were not just sent to any individual but to people who deal with the county, people from ratings agencies and other people who we deal with on a daily basis.”

Collins’ aides had wondered: Did a hacker seize the boss’ e-mail account?

As it turns out, forwarding an article or an editorial under someone else’s e-mail is easy to do from The News Web site and other sites. Buffalonews.com asks the sender to type in their own e-mail address, but the sender can type in any address as their own.

The e-mails arrive with a caution: “The sender’s e-mail address has not been verified.”

The e-mails went to some well-known officials, such as State Senate Majority Leader Joseph L. Bruno, and some who would be known to county financial officials, such as Megan Neuberger, credit analyst for Fitch Ratings in New York City.

Neuberger had helped assess Erie County’s credit when Kenneth Vetter was county’s budget director. He now is executive director of the Fiscal Stability Authority, also known as the control board.

Rest assured, no one in the control board’s offices sent the e-mail, Vetter said Tuesday.

“Nothing came out from this office in any way, shape or form,” he said.

Legislature Chairwoman Lynn M. Marinelli, who also received the message, said she wondered why Collins was calling attention to an editorial opposing his position.

A Collins assistant, meanwhile, discovered a canned response from Bruno’s account saying the “comments and suggestions are very important to me.” But Collins had not sent an e-mail to Bruno.

Poloncarz was tipped off when Neuberger responded to the e-mail.

“Not sure if you were aware that I moved out of the public finance department at Fitch last summer,” she reminded Poloncarz.

“I’m like, ‘what’s up with this?’ ” Poloncarz said.

mspina@buffnews.com

Copyright 2008 - The Buffalo News