Law shines light on public business
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
A bumper sticker sometimes seen on cars in the region says something like: "If you can read this, thank a teacher." Today's column offers a bit of a twist on that theme: If you know what's going on with the government, thank a newspaper.
Open meetings and open records are protected by legislation that gives every person in this country a right to know what's happening in public buildings and how their tax dollars are being spent.
Open records rulings explain why readers can go to BeaumontEnterprise-.comand find out the salaries of county or state employees; TAKS scores at a child's school; library locations; or the number of foreclosures in their county.
A New York Times story earlier this month bemoaned the fact that many newspapers, facing financial struggles, have curtailed their efforts on behalf of open records.
Enterprise readers should know that though we've documented some of our challenges and cost reductions here, open records battles remain a priority.
The Enterprise fought to get TAKS results from one local charter school, feeling that parents of students enrolled there had the right to know about the measure of the school's overall performance.
Similarly, The Enterprise continues to work with the Texas Attorney General's office to gain access to Beaumont Police Department's Use of Force reports in an effort to review any patterns that might reveal themselves in those records.
The city of Beaumont has opposed release of those records claiming that they are part of personnel records and therefore not subject to public information rulings. The Attorney General, for the record, disagrees with that finding.
Citizens, and their media counterparts, need to be diligent about continuing to uphold this law.
*
In other newspaper-related news, an Associated Press story this week reported the results of a Pew Research Center for the People & the Press survey that revealed that more and more people think the work of the media is inaccurate and biased.
In 1985, 34 percent of respondents to the survey believed stories were "frequently inaccurate." The July survey of more than 1,500 adults now says a whopping 74 percent of respondents "believe stories tend to favor one side of an issue over another." That result reflected a 66 percent increase on a poll two years ago.
Although Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times, acknowledged that some of the problems can be attributed to belt-tightening budgets at newspapers across the country, he didn't think all of the blame belonged there.
"The great flood that goes under the heading 'news media' has been poisoned by junk blogs, gossip sheets, shout radio and cable-TV partisans that don't deserve to be trusted," he wrote The Associated Press in an e-mail.
Most professional journalists are keenly aware of this perception and seriously recognize a ed to be diligent with facts and protective of unbiased presentation of the news. We hope most readers will recognize that all "media" are not created equal.
A bumper sticker sometimes seen on cars in the region says something like: "If you can read this, thank a teacher." Today's column offers a bit of a twist on that theme: If you know what's going on with the government, thank a newspaper.
Open meetings and open records are protected by legislation that gives every person in this country a right to know what's happening in public buildings and how their tax dollars are being spent.
Open records rulings explain why readers can go to BeaumontEnterprise-.comand find out the salaries of county or state employees; TAKS scores at a child's school; library locations; or the number of foreclosures in their county.
A New York Times story earlier this month bemoaned the fact that many newspapers, facing financial struggles, have curtailed their efforts on behalf of open records.
Enterprise readers should know that though we've documented some of our challenges and cost reductions here, open records battles remain a priority.
The Enterprise fought to get TAKS results from one local charter school, feeling that parents of students enrolled there had the right to know about the measure of the school's overall performance.
Similarly, The Enterprise continues to work with the Texas Attorney General's office to gain access to Beaumont Police Department's Use of Force reports in an effort to review any patterns that might reveal themselves in those records.
The city of Beaumont has opposed release of those records claiming that they are part of personnel records and therefore not subject to public information rulings. The Attorney General, for the record, disagrees with that finding.
Citizens, and their media counterparts, need to be diligent about continuing to uphold this law.
*
In other newspaper-related news, an Associated Press story this week reported the results of a Pew Research Center for the People & the Press survey that revealed that more and more people think the work of the media is inaccurate and biased.
In 1985, 34 percent of respondents to the survey believed stories were "frequently inaccurate." The July survey of more than 1,500 adults now says a whopping 74 percent of respondents "believe stories tend to favor one side of an issue over another." That result reflected a 66 percent increase on a poll two years ago.
Although Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times, acknowledged that some of the problems can be attributed to belt-tightening budgets at newspapers across the country, he didn't think all of the blame belonged there.
"The great flood that goes under the heading 'news media' has been poisoned by junk blogs, gossip sheets, shout radio and cable-TV partisans that don't deserve to be trusted," he wrote The Associated Press in an e-mail.
Most professional journalists are keenly aware of this perception and seriously recognize a ed to be diligent with facts and protective of unbiased presentation of the news. We hope most readers will recognize that all "media" are not created equal.
posted by Sheila Friedeck at 2:05 PM
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