Transparency by Government Agencies

I am always a little bit astounded when government officials are surprised or even angered that I know something about what is going on behind closed doors. I have news for them. Government “by the people and for the people” is not supposed to be done in secret. Things shouldn’t be done behind closed doors. Secret government actions are the enemy of democracies.

The liberties of people never were, nor ever will be, secure, when the transactions of their rulers may be concealed from them. Patrick Henry, June 5, 1788.

The community should know what government is doing. If things are being done in secret, that is kind of illegal, a HUGE red flag, and reveals character of those involved

There are not to be secret conversations between BOE or council members. Central offices should not be constructing plans that the community doesn’t know about. No decisions are to be agreed upon prior to meetings. Privacy is to be the exception and not the rule.

If you are in public education and you are trying to run your government entity like a private corporation, you need to stop. Democratic governments, by nature, are to be transparent.

And let me be very, very clear. FOIA requests are real. Sunshine laws are real. The former is utilized to get to the bottom of the truth. The latter is legal accountability for those who skirt it.

I was approached several years ago by someone who(over breakfast) overheard two government officials discussing the replacement of a locally appointed position within that government. They discussed names of replacements. They talked about how that would transpire. All of it came to pass. Is that legal? You make the call.

Lastly, I have been pretty slow in addressing the following. It is now time to begin the process of petitioning the government to be better.

it is not the place of government officials to threaten citizens through third parties. Governments are not to bully citizens. Citizens have a right to speak at BOE meetings, PTA meetings, and by running for office. If governments are trying to interfere with those proceedings, that is bordering on corruption, ethics violations and totalitarianism to name a few. Do you really think folks are not paying attention to these offenses? Literally…the talk of the town.

Government business is meant to be done in the light of day.

The one positive for citizens with an expectation of transparency by those working for us in the government….Once information is in digital format, it is there forever. It is either on a server or in a data bank or stored in a cloud backup or stored in email redundancy platforms or security cameras or GPS or OnStar or credit cards or on some server in the middle of nowhere. All one has to do is request it. If that doesn’t work or the request is incomplete, there are other legal avenues to pursue the truth.

Just a friendly reminder.

Licensed thumbnail photo by fermate.