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"A popular government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy; or perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives."
-- James Madison
Sunshine week, that time intended to showcase the importance of access to the meetings in which your elected and appointed officials discuss your business as well as your right to ask for and easily receive all sorts of public records, wrapped up Saturday. But that doesn't mean we all should stop caring.
Sunshine week may be seven days, but the sun should be shining on our government all year round.
Let's face it, every discussion or decision made by government is your business, and you, as a citizen, have a right to know about it. Likewise, every document -- whether it's on paper, in the form of a video or audio recording or in a computer hard drive -- is owned by you. That's what makes America great.
The problem is, sometimes those in government forget that.
Sadly, no matter how often we at the Tribune Chronicle write about the importance of public access, there always will be governments that refuse to share information.
Just last Tuesday, the Tribune Chronicle published a wire story reporting on the state of Hawaii's refusal to release records about its investigation into the false missile alert in January.
Remember that? It was that event that had residents and visitors scrambling, thinking they might die in a nuclear blast -- or at least fearing that the end of the world as they knew it was imminent.
Hawaii officials have repeatedly pointed to a low-level state employee and a breakdown in his agency's leadership as the main cause for the alert. But efforts to find out more about what other top officials did that day have been stymied at the highest levels of state government for nearly two months.
Some of the things they've denied despite media and public requests? Call logs, text messages, instant messages and calendars related to the missile alert.
Withholding such information, the Associated Press reported, is not rare among many state agencies, including Hawaii and all across the United States.
Ohio's open records laws certainly become less meaningful each time our state legislators find ways to create new exemptions to transparency.
There are more than 30 exemptions to the public records laws in Ohio, and each of those exemptions go into even greater detail to spell out what the public may not have access to. It seems to me when I started out as a reporter in Ohio some 25 years ago, less than a dozen exemptions existed. Every time new limits are created, government becomes less transparent.
Yet, we journalists keep asking.
There is never a day that a Tribune Chronicle reporter doesn't ask for a police report or a court docket. We ask for government spending plans, police dash camera videos and letters and emails exchanged among your elected officials. We ask questions about disciplinary action involving teachers who teach our kids, about hiring practices in county government and whether local jails are treating inmates humanely. We collect real estate transfers, property tax records, election results and so many other items that cannot all be named here.
At a time when the news media is under constant scrutiny, it's very important for the public to remember that it's your local newspapers -- like the Tribune Chronicle -- that represent your needs and concerns every time we file a public record request.
As James Madison so eloquently stated, knowledge governs ignorance.
And it's access to information that breeds knowledge.
blinert@tribtoday.com