The Frankfort State Journal "is as willing and able as ever to stand up for citizens' right to know about the activities of their governments." Citizens, too, must stand up for their rights by opposing HB 312.
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"My friend Al Cross this week declared Kentucky 'news organizations' to be 'less willing or able' to defend government transparency laws.
"The assertion in a Society of Professional Journalists statement about a current legislative effort to weaken the state's Open Records Act was part of a tortured defense of the Kentucky Press Association's non-position on the matter and a simultaneous call to arms of other stakeholders to advocate for transparency because newspapers, in Cross' opinion, don't have the wherewithal.
"Other publishers can and should speak for themselves, but let the record show that The State Journal is as willing and able as ever to stand up for citizens' right to know about the activities of their governments. House Bill 312 is unquestionably an effort to make government less transparent and should be defeated. Full stop.
"The Kentucky Press Association, of which my newspaper is a proud member, has taken a beating among sunshine advocates for a conscious decision to 'not oppose' the legislation on the grounds that the newspaper advocacy organization participated in negotiations with lawmakers and opposing interest groups like the Kentucky League of Cities and thus prevented the bill from being even worse.
"KPA's position was used as cover by many lawmakers who voted to send the bill to the Senate. If newspapers are OK with it, the logic goes, then this can't be too bad.
"Skeptics' immediate assumption was that KPA had made a deal with the devil to preserve newspaper publication of paid public notices by local and state governments. Those notices are a significant source of revenue for newspapers, including this one, and lawmakers across the country have been working for decades, sometimes successfully, to move them to government websites.
"KPA, to its membership and publicly, insisted that its position on HB 312 had nothing to do with saving public notices, prompting Cross' passionate defense of the organization and its leadership to his substantial social media following, even as he painted news organizations (aka KPA member newspapers) as too financially weak and scared to defend the state's open records law.
"The mixed messaging fueled critics like the Kentucky Open Government Coalition, which has vigorously fought the bill KPA declined to oppose. In three decades of belonging to and leading state press associations, and being on the front lines of legislative battles over transparency and public notices, I've never before seen major transparency organizations on different sides of an open records overhaul, much less snipe at each other in public.
"Citizens are left to believe one of two things:
• That KPA's position on HB 312 indeed has nothing to do with public notices and that other transparency advocates should, like KPA, shut up and not risk a bill that goes even further in gutting the open records law.
• The cynics are right and KPA must concede occasional defeats on transparency laws in order to keep public notices in newspapers.
"But one can't say it's about the first and insinuate that the other is a factor. Standing up for sunshine laws doesn't require deep pockets. One just has to be 'willing.' Being 'less able' infers a dependence on public notice revenue that compromises newspapers' core value of promoting government transparency.
Kentucky newspapers have taken a black eye over this issue and would be wise to, individually or collectively, take a strong stand before the Senate takes up HB 312.
"The State Journal opposes it unapologetically."
Steve Stewart is publisher of The State Journal. His email address is steve.stewart@state-journal.com
