By Shannon McFarlin WENK/WTPR News Director
Huntingdon, Tenn.—A large group of area media representatives and public officials met today to discuss openness in government and a new state law on public records at a seminar hosted by the Associated Publishers, Inc. API is based in Huntingdon and is the publisher of six community newspapers.
In addition to area media representatives, those in attendance included Carroll County Mayor Kenny McBride, Huntingdon Mayor Dale Kelley, McKenzie Mayor Jill Holland, Trenton Mayor Rickey Jackson, Milan Mayor BW Beasley, Huntingdon Director of Public Safety Walter Smothers, McKenzie Police Chief Craig Moates, McKenzie Industrial Development Board Executive Director Frank Tate and Milan Schools Director Jonathan Criswell.
The seminar was conducted by Deborah Fisher, executive director of the Tennessee Coalition of Open Government (TCOG), who has a background working for newspapers, including The Tennessean.
Fisher said, “I like to see journalists and public officials together in the same room”, noting that brings about dialogue between the media and government. TCOG is a coalition of media professionals and outlets, law professionals and educators who strive to improve public access to the governmental meetings and the records held by those agencies. It is a hotline for open government issues and provides workshops on public records and open meetings.
The basis for Tennessee’s open meetings law—and the open meetings laws in all the other states—is that “People deserve to know what their government is doing”, she said. “A public record becomes a public record when it’s created. Not when it’s finalized, but when it’s created.”
Tennessee’s open meetings law can be vague in its use of such terms as ‘adequate notice’, but Fisher said, “At the end of the day, government business is supposed to be done in the public. That is the big picture to keep in mind and the media is very important in keeping the government officials accountable.”
Common sense and openness should govern many matters between media and government and court rulings have been broadly construed to give the broadest access to public records, she said.
Recently, a new state law required all governmental entities to develop a Public Records Policy, according to the TCOG which established timelines for compliance to requests for records, established who is the custodian of the records and set the cost of reproducing those records. All governmental agencies had to comply by July 16 to establish the new policy.
Photo: Deborah Fisher speaking at today’s seminar. Shannon McFarlin photo
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