So this is probably going to be an unpopular opinion, but who knows? I feel like I'm not going to like the general consensus in any case, but here goes.
What I've seen generally is that Admins and Staff should be held accountable to the very rules they write. In this case, it's activity level. If you're required to post for each character once a month, then even a staff member should expect that their character will be deleted at the activity check. At least, his is how we conduct our activity sweeps. Characters are required to post once a month and any accounts that have not posted since the last AC is deleted from the system completely.
Now, I've seen in the rules on some sites that specifically say that staff and admins are exempt from activity checks. The reason? Because they're staff. Now that sounds narcissistic, but consider the job of an admin or staff member. They update the site, they read applications and accept them, they have to create and write the site-wide plots, they control the NPCs (generally), they conduct the activity checks and clear the board of clutter (old/inactive threads), they advertise, and they moderate the members both on the site and in the cbox. Depending on how much staff you have, this can be a lot of work, and takes up a lot of free time that may otherwise be spent posting. The end result is staff members who have inactive characters of their own that they don't want to give up because maybe they can't keep up with a 1/month requirement, but they can keep up with a 1/two months at least.
Solutions? Delete the characters outright, staff can't be exempt. Don't have so many characters. If you can't handle them, you shouldn't have them. Hire more staff members. If staff work is taking up all your time, then you don't have enough. Change the activity requirements to something that the staff can keep up with.
My opinion is that while it shouldn't be abused, that staff shouldn't feel guilty either if they have to give themselves an exception in order to keep characters they know they're going to post with. Their activity may be slow, but it's not nonexistent. They aren't ghost members who are never around. They plot with other members quite well and frequently. They're on top of their staff duties as well.
What are you're guys' opinions on this? I'm hoping to find a solution that doesn't involve having to give up characters that are actually well plotted out. :/