Open government key for us all, speakers say

Citizens and the news media need to be vigilant about demanding open government, particularly in the face of efforts to limit the disclosure of public records, speakers at a public forum said Tuesday night.

"It's just a real difficult time for democracy," said Mike Fancher, vice president of the nonprofit Washington Coalition for Open Government and former executive editor of The Seattle Times.

The forum, sponsored by the coalition and The Times, coincided with "Sunshine Week," a nationwide initiative to promote open government and freedom of information.

Fancher and Jim Neff, investigations editor for The Times, said much of the recent focus has been on what Neff called "rear-guard actions" to keep state legislators from "blowing holes" in the public's access to government documents.

Both emphasized that open government should be a nonpartisan issue important to all citizens, regardless of where they stand across the political spectrum.

"We fight about everything, except the need to hold government accountable," Fancher said of the coalition's members, noting they include Democrats and Republicans, labor and business representatives and others with different backgrounds.

Meredith Mechling, a Monroe citizen, told the audience of her battle to obtain public records from the city, which grew out of her curiosity about secret meetings, development issues and ethics practices.

She described her lengthy and frustrating legal fight to obtain e-mails between city officials in which she learned that some people were provided more information than others because of "who you are" in the community.

Ultimately, the city agreed to pay Mechling $157,000 in attorney fees, costs and penalties for withholding materials

Matt Rosenberg, a creator of Public Eye Northwest, a nonprofit formed last year to boost digital literacy, build community news and promote best practices in government transparency, spoke about his organization and its website, Public Data Ferret.

One of the organization's primary goals is to educate citizens about "stuff already out there" on government websites, such as federal inspector-general reports covering a wide range of subjects, Rosenberg said.

Some cities are providing detailed online mapping of police reports and building permits, he added.

Citizens need to dig up more in the public realm because newspapers aren't able to cover as much as they once did, he said, referring to the economic challenges confronting the news media.

"The community has to step up and take more of a role," Rosenberg said.

Neff said Times reporters regularly rely on public-record requests to obtain crucial information, citing the newspaper's series of stories about serious problems in adult family homes, "Seniors for Sale," as a prime example.

One problem, he said, is small government agencies that don't understand their obligations and need training on public-disclosure laws.

Officials shouldn't be able to use the "baloney excuse" that they are cash-strapped to avoid what the law requires, Neff said.

Mechling said she would like to see public officials have to personally pay costs when they willfully withhold information instead of using taxpayer money.

Steve Miletich: 206-464-3302 or smiletich@seattletimes.com