Sunshine Law

The News-Leader's Chad Livengood has written a series of articles about the Department of Natural Resources' decision to delay the release of information about elevated E.coli readings taken in late May. Today's story features a number of critics who suggest that citizens may have to invoke "'magic' words" to obtain information under the state's Sunshine Law, and that the Attorney General's office took an unnecessarily narrow reading of the law in its investigation into alleged violations of the Sunshine Law by the DNR .

However, when considering the full AGO report, today's article seems to be missing some key information.

Maybe the News-Leader forgot that Ron Richard has already accomplished everything there is to reasonably accomplish on ethics reform? 

Lawmakers ignored reform
Transparency bill to end "village law"-type secrecy failed to pass.

So much for good intentions. State Rep. Dennis Wood spoke like he was full of them early this year. But when it came time to make good, he came up short....

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A spot-on editorial from the Warrensburg Daily Star-Journal:

Rep. Denny Hoskins should have shouted "no" at Sen. Delbert Scott and the ill-conceived bill to reduce public information about elected officials; instead, Hoskins erred on the side of government secrecy by agreeing to handle Scott's bill in the House.

The bill would hide information from the public about elected officials in 61 cities, including Knob Noster. Public officials now fill out a form naming their potential conflicts of interest. Voters should know if a real estate dealer on a city council might have land of interest to the city, whether a banker is involved with city deposits, whether a developer might seek friendlier zoning laws and so forth. A simple form helps do this, but Hoskins and Scott want to end disclosures in some cities under the premise that the forms are a bother and might discourage people from public service.

The premise is hogwash....

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From the editorial board at The Maneater:

All other government officials, including the governor, are subjected to the Sunshine Law, but the legislators are apparently in a league of their own. With the FBI looking into pay-to-play schemes among Missouri legislators, now is the time we need legislators to make their records public.

These legislators are dealing with thousands of dollars in campaign contributions, yet we cannot have the ability to know what is going on inside their offices.

Further, there is no way to make this situation look good for anyone who voted against it. The first and natural question that comes to our mind is what the politician might be hiding that they do not want disclosed...

In the same bill, the House voted to strengthen the penalty for violating the Sunshine Law from $5,000 to $8,000. Yet the legislators are not willing to abide by the law they wrote...

Read the whole thing here.