Politics & Government

County Employees Say Patch Was Blocked

Site access was restored after Patch called. Reason for block remains unknown—probably a "glitch," a spokesman said.

County government employees attempting to log on to area Patch websites were greeted Thursday afternoon with a message saying the sites had been blocked.

Calls from general county government employees complaining about the outage began after lunch. Users were able to access other news sites such as The Baltimore Sun, New York Times, Washington Post and WBAL radio.

Some employees said they were able to access Patch sites in the morning but could not later in the day.

Find out what's happening in Towsonfor free with the latest updates from Patch.

Access to Patch sites did not appear to be denied to employees inside other government agencies such as the library system and Baltimore County Public Schools.

Don Mohler, a county spokesman, acknowledged that Patch was not accessible on county computers. Mohler said he could not immediately explain the cause.

Find out what's happening in Towsonfor free with the latest updates from Patch.

"It could be a glitch, maybe an ad or something that tripped a fail-safe," Mohler said.

Mohler, in an e-mail about 30 mins later, said access had been restored.

Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.