Hot dawg, after its nadir with football, on Day Six the “Mississippi: The Secret State” series rebounds with something more fun, from the Clarion-Ledger‘s Chris Joyner again, on the cranks and hecklers so vital to good gummint: Private citizens often lead charge to challenge government secrecy. Why, here comes one now:
JACKSON — Many towns have a Bob Bryant, and those that don’t would do well to get one.
For the past several years, Bryant has been the open-government advocate for Crenshaw, a Delta city [sic] of about 900.
“He’s a relentless sort of guy,” said John Howell, publisher of The Panolian, the local newspaper that covers Crenshaw politics. “He’s a real thorn in their side.”
Bryant, a retired Shelby County, Tenn., sheriff’s deputy, is even more frank.
“I worry the crap out of them,” he said.
Y’see, Bob Bryant didn’t like the effect dilapidated properties were having on local land values, so he started showing up at Crenshaw’s Board of Aldermen meetings late in 2005. Attending a few of these convinced him that too much business was going on in closed session “because they didn’t want to fool with the public.”
No one would answer simple questions, like how much the city owed its creditors or how a $300,000 housing grant was being spent, he said.
So Bryant stared filing requests for the city’s financial documents.
“I just went in there looking,” he said. “I wanted to look at the financial records and minutes of prior board meetings.”
Crenshaw officials ignored him until he hired a lawyer to send them a letter warning that the town was violating state law. Now, having kept up his hounding and threats of lawsuits, Bryant thinks he’s seen some improvement but “not near enough.” He thinks the Open Meetings and Public Records laws just too flamin’ weak.
“Once they stonewall you, you’ve got to get into your pocket and hire lawyers. Why should we have to do that?” he said. “You are out here doing the government’s job for them without any resources.”
Leonard Van Slyke, the Jackson lawyer expert in open-government law, agrees:
“There should be an attitude from public officials that we want to make as much information as possible public and exercise exemptions only when necessary,” he said.
The state Public Records law begins with the statement that allowing access to records is Mississippi state policy and that providing access is the duty of public officials. Van Slyke said the law does not require any public official to withhold a document because all of the state exemptions can be waived at the government’s discretion.
Van Slyke said the lack of any system of appeal short of bringing a civil lawsuit is a real shortcoming in state law. It is a tremendous burden on citizens to bring a state or local agency to circuit court just to get access to a record.
Ain’t like that most other places. In Connecticut and Utah, for instance, citizens can appeal to special commissions if they’re denied records. Arizona, Iowa, and Georgia (for only three) either have public records ombudsmen or give the state’s attorney general authority to intervene.
Joyner describes how Jack Ryan, executive editor of the McComb Enterprise Journal, in 2007 joined Southwest Broadcasting, Inc., to sue the city of McComb for violating the state’s open meetings law.
The newspaper and the broadcast company alleged McComb Mayor Zach Patterson and the city’s Board of Selectmen had violated state law by meeting in closed session to vote on pay raises for city employees, increased police patrols in high-crime areas and the creation of a new city department. The city settled the lawsuit in August, agreeing to pay $9,600 to the plaintiffs to cover a portion of the legal fees involved in bringing the suit.
Patterson, who does not have a vote on the board, opposed the decision, as did Selectman Melvin Joe Johnson, who cast the lone vote against settling.
Selectman Johnson told the paper that any violation of the law was unintentional — the board had just gone into closed session to discuss personnel issues.
Ryan said he was reluctant to sue the city and first tried talking to Patterson, who took office in January 2007, about the newspaper’s concerns. The raises and other measures represented a pretty big expenditure for the city of about $13,600, he said.
“People need to know if the city can afford this,” he said.
When city officials did not budge, the media companies filed suit. Ryan said he felt like he had no choice.
“To let that go is to basically say, ‘You can do this whenever you want,’ ” he said.
Brent Cox of the American Civil Liberties Union says public officials in Mississippi “typically react badly” to questions about violations of the Public Records and Open Meetings laws, something he ascribes to the history of secrecy and the hurdles that state law includes to discourage citizens from pressing their rights.
“People don’t have the time or money to begin a lawsuit against a government body,” he says. “We’re willing to do it, but you shouldn’t have to go through the ACLU to get a public document.” Of course, if you live in a state where steam comes out of many ears at the mere mention of “ACLU” — whatcha gonna expect?
Apparently, Bob Bryant was the one-and-only Bob Bryant that Joyner could locate in the whole place. You reckon?
