I was able to fix this by simply following the instructions in bug 580706 for manually editing the akonadi configuration file to use sqlite. If I delete the akonadi configuration file, the next time akonadi-server is run, it regenerates an akonadi configuration file with "mysql" as the database backend even though the mysql backend isn't installed.
Miho:/home/david/.config/akonadi# dpkg -l '*akonadi*' | grep ^ii ii akonadi-backend-sqlite 1.7.2-1 i386 SQLite storage backend for Akonadi ii akonadi-dbg 1.7.2-1 i386 debugging symbols for the Akonadi PIM storage service ii akonadi-server 1.7.2-1 i386 Akonadi PIM storage service ii libakonadi-contact4 4:4.8.4-1 i386 library for using the Akonadi PIM data server ii libakonadi-kabc4 4:4.8.4-1 i386 library for using the Akonadi PIM data server ii libakonadi-kcal4 4:4.8.4-1 i386 library for using the Akonadi PIM data server ii libakonadi-kde4 4:4.8.4-1 i386 library for using the Akonadi PIM data server ii libakonadi-kmime4 4:4.8.4-1 i386 library for using the Akonadi PIM data server ii libakonadiprotocolinternals1 1.7.2-1 i386 libraries for the Akonadi PIM storage service Miho:/home/david/.config/akonadi# dpkg -l '*mysql*' | grep ^ii ii libmysqlclient18:i386 5.5.24+dfsg-7 i386 MySQL database client library ii mysql-common 5.5.24+dfsg-7 all MySQL database common files, e.g. /etc/mysql/my.cnf
