In order to be able to define "enhanced messaging preferences" for each patron category, and also each patron, a system preference needs to be activated. There is a separate system preference to de-activate it at the opac, which makes a lot of sense, but i think on the staff interface it should always be on, it is up to the administrator to set it up then, without having to find a system preference.
We now default EnhancedMessagingPreferences to 1 for new installations. I am not sure if there is a use case where showing the preferences always and by default would be bad. Should we remove the preference?
I agree the messaging preferences should always be visible in the staff interface. I think there's a case for them not being modifiable by all members of staff (so they don't stray from the patron category defaults) or for only some messaging preferences to be modifiable in the Opac... but those thoughts would be for other bugs!!
The only case I would see where it *could* be hidden would be a very small library who does not send emails/sms at all, it could clutter up the patron record. But I think those would be very few. I checked our smallest clients (meaning the ones with fewest patrons), and in the ones with under 500 patrons, only one has the pref disabled, a small school. It's a client who has been with us for a while and it was probably before the pref was enabled automatically and we probably did not enable the pref ourselves either.