A week devoted to sunshine

A week devoted to sunshine

Today is the beginning of day- light-saving time, that day on which we gain an hour of light at the end of the day and, appropriately, the first day of National Sunshine Week. A lot more people know about DST than Sunshine Week, which is a shame.

Sunshine Week is a creation of the American Society of News Editors, and over the years has attracted the support of print, broadcast and online news media, civics groups, non-profits, schools and libraries.

During the last decades of the 20th century, Ohio was fortunate to have a Legislature that recognized the value of open government and approved laws requiring open meetings and public records.

Unfortunate backsliding

Some of those safeguards have been broken down through amendments that opened loopholes for special interests, through adverse court rulings, through ignorance of the law or outright defiance of it by elected or appointed officials and through some complacency by the public and the press.

That’s a dangerous combination that will, over the years, shift power from the hands of the people to the hands of the governors. No one should be intimidated when asking any government entity for information on how decisions are being made that affect the public’s well-being or the public pocketbook.

To paraphrase 19th century abolitionist Wendell Phillips, the price of liberty is eternal vigilance. But vigilance is impossible when the people are kept in the dark.