Nearly every box on the calendar has a celebration attached to it these days. In March, we’ve got both the traditional — St. Patrick’s Day — and the offbeat — Thursday was Pi Day (3/14).
But in addition to the annual celebration of a mathematical anomaly and tasty baked goods, the past week was set aside for a little-known observance outside the journalism community — Sunshine Week.
Sunshine Week, a nationwide observance taking place March 10 through 16 this year, is a week set aside to remember the public’s right to know and journalism’s role in shining a light on government officials and agencies.
Luckily for our readers, Washington has some of the strongest public records and open public meetings laws in the country, and The Chronicle uses those laws consistently to give Lewis and South Thurston County residents a full and accurate picture of what’s going on in their taxpayer-funded programs.
Starting last year, reporter Alex Brown used public records requests to uncover a proposal to close a third of Timberland Regional Library facilities, including many in our coverage area. His stories inspired members of the public to attend public Timberland board meetings to speak their mind, successfully convincing the board to abandon the plan.
Meanwhile, Will Rubin is continuing to use the state’s public records laws to shine a light on a series of shady issues coming out of Twin Transit. Our reporting, and the public outrage that followed, led to a change of leadership, which we sincerely hope leads to more open and efficient management of the public agency.
It’s not just those major issues — all of our reporters regularly request public records from agencies and municipalities large and small in an effort to maintain our readers’ rights to transparent government.
But all across the country and here in Washington, local newspapers like The Chronicle are closing their doors or severely cutting back newsgathering operations due to financial strain. Without our robust newsroom, we wouldn’t be able to be the check on government waste or irresponsibility that we have been, particularly in the past few years.
The work we do to shine a light on government — during Sunshine Week and every other week in the year — is funded by you when you buy a paper at your local grocery story, get a subscription or buy an advertisement.
If you value the work we do, please consider supporting your local newspaper.
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It’s important to note that reporters aren’t the only ones with access to these records. The tools we use to obtain public records are available for everyone. Anyone can request a public record, and perhaps more importantly, anyone can attend a public meeting of a county, city, port, school district, or transit benefit district. Often, our reporters are the only ones in attendance at these meetings. If you’re able, we urge you to show up and make your voices heard.
