Something is in the air. There is a cloud of consternation lingering over our coastal towns. This past month our reporters found themselves uncomfortable as they endured berating from the dais and strained encounters with and between government officials. In most of these situations it was because someone either didn’t like how we said something, or were concerned about how we might say something.
Here’s a tip: If you don’t want people to know you’ve said or done something, don’t say or do it in a public meeting.
That you don’t want people to know what you said isn’t our problem. And just because you’re in a small town, don’t assume there won’t be a reporter there to hear you say it. As long as this newspaper publishes, there will be.
And just because we are a small publication, don’t assume you can control what we publish. You are welcome to make suggestions, and we are open to neighborly advice. But when you demand to control the message, it raises our First Amendment hackles.
Our job isn’t PR. News media are surrogates for the public, reporting information people want to know to make informed decisions. We take our profession seriously. And we do our best to stay fair.
At the same time, we are your neighbors and sometimes we find ourselves sympathetic to some sensitive issue or another in our cities and towns. At these times we may feel a need for velvet gloves — and we will wear them. At other times we feel obligated to tighten up the laces on our boxing gloves to assure the sun shines on the actions of government officials.
Our Constitution guarantees us this freedom of the press.
We believe, as Woodrow Wilson said, that “light is the only thing that can sweeten our political atmosphere and open to view the innermost chambers of government.”
That’s why the 50 states, the District of Columbia and the federal government all have adopted so-called sunshine laws. These laws make the sausage-making of government available for all to view.
Since watching this process often is not pretty, our job is to take on the mantle of a free press and demand the right of public access to government proceedings (including records). We need to do our job of informing readers without government interference.
I’m hoping that all the consternation in the air is just trickle-down from the national political scene and that after Nov. 8 we can shed our petty differences and return civility to our coastal towns.
— Mary Kate Leming,
Editor
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