From the Winston-Salem Journal (3/20/09): Sunshine is an apt metaphor for openness and transparency in government. Very little grows in darkness; good does not dwell there. Light, on the other hand, is necessary for life and renewal. So it is with knowledge. We don't learn if we cannot see.
This week as we recognize Sunshine Week, a national initiative each year to encourage dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information, the forecast has gone from overcast to partly cloudy. But the long view is better than it has been in some time.
With urging by the American Society of Newspaper Editors, the sponsor of Sunshine Week, and other groups, President Obama last month ordered all federal agencies to adopt a “presumption in favor of disclosure” when dealing with requests under the Freedom of Information Act. In contrast to the secrecy and seeming contempt for open government by the previous administration, this act is a significant step out of the darkness.
The percentage of adults who think the federal government is somewhat or very secretive has grown from 62 percent in 2006 to 74 percent in 2008, according to the ASNE. The latest survey reports that Obama’s FOIA directive is supported by eight in 10 adults who think it is “the right thing to do.”
Other good things are happening on the national level. Earlier this week, Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont wrote on these pages about the first budget passed this month for the Office of Government Information Services at the National Archives, which was established by the 2007 Open Government Act authored by Leahy and Sen. John Cornyn of Texas. The bill creates a FOIA ombudsman who will mediate inter-agency FOIA disputes to expedite requests for public information. Most journalists will tell you that FOIA requests can take months and years to be fully answered, if at all.
In North Carolina, which unfortunately is still a partly cloudy state when it comes to openness and transparency in government, there are signs of progress.
Gov. Bev Perdue recently repeated her promise to bring transparency and accountability to state government. “This is the time to stand up to the sweet seductions of special interests, to the temptations of politically popular pork-barrel spending, and end the practice of backroom dealing,” Perdue told a joint session of the N.C. General Assembly. “Those days are gone, because we simply cannot afford them in these perilous times.”
At the vanguard of public access to the operations of government are the North Carolina Press Association and the recently created North Carolina Open Government Coalition. The press association represents the working press in North Carolina and the coalition seeks to bring all parties together, including media, libraries, nonprofit organizations, schools and others interested in the public’s right to know.
Several important milestones have been reached and other initiatives are under way. A bill pushed by the press association that became law Jan. 1 gives the public the right to see all forms of compensation for public employees, not just salaries. The case started with a lawsuit by The Charlotte Observer that sought salary and bonus information for an outgoing public-hospital executive.
The NCPA this year will push access to certain records in the personnel files of public employees involving misconduct. And another attempt will be made to mandate in the Public Records Law the automatic recovery of legal expenses by those who win public-records law claims.
The latter is standard in many other states as a way to have teeth in public-records laws. The sad truth is that today in North Carolina many custodians of public records can and do ignore the Public Records Law with impunity. Until that changes, the sunshine will not truly shine on the operations of government.
Winston-Salem Journal Staff Editorial