The Endless Battle

On hundreds of occasions when I was a newspaperman I went round and round with government officials over access to public records.

Some of them must never have read North Carolina’s public records law, G.S. 132-1, or, if they had, they didn’t understand it.  Basically, the law says that all state and local government records are public — written documents, photographs, tape recordings, everything unless there’s  another law that says they aren’t, like the laws protecting tax returns, medical records, SBI investigations, things like that, from public disclosure.

They’d say stuff like, “I’ve worked here 25 years and we’ve never released that record,” as if that mattered.

Some wanted to know why I wanted the record.  State law didn’t require me –and doesn’t require you– to tell them and, when you get right down to it, it’s none of their business.

They sometimes tried to overcharge the newspaper I worked for, The News & Observer.

A state Department of Transportation lawyer sent me a letter saying a database we wanted would cost the newspaper twenty-something thousand dollars.

While this may seem exorbitant…” he said in the letter, proving that lawyers do so have sense of humor.

My favorite encounter over public records involved my request for a copy of an accident report from the N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles headquarters in Raleigh.  The report, the DVM clerk conceded, was public. But the accident report index, without which you couldn’t find an individual report, was not public, he said.

Huh?  Says who?

The clerk said that’s what an assistant attorney general who advised DMV on such matters had told him. At my request he asked that attorney to join us.

Sure enough, that was his position: the accident report was public but the index wasn’t. That was so nutty, in my opinion, there was no point in discussing it.  Might as well cut to the chase.

I said, “Bill, The N&O is going to rely on G.S. 132-1, which says that index is public. What law are you going to rely on that says it isn’t?”

He hemmed and hawed but he didn’t cite a statute.

So I asked him again.  He beat around the bush some more.  I said, “Bill, you’re wasting our time. What law are you going to rely on?”

“There isn’t a law,” he said,“but there ought to be.”

I said, “Bill, are you listening to yourself?”

Postscript: DMV let me see the index and I found, and copied, the accident report I wanted.

NOTE:

§ 132-1. “Public records” defined.

(a) “Public record” or “public records” shall mean all documents, papers, letters, maps, books, photographs, films, sound recordings, magnetic or other tapes, electronic data-processing records, artifacts, or other documentary material, regardless of physical form or characteristics, made or received pursuant to law or ordinance in connection with the transaction of public business by any agency of North Carolina government or its subdivisions. Agency of North Carolina government or its subdivisions shall mean and include every public office, public officer or official (State or local, elected or appointed), institution, board, commission, bureau, council, department, authority or other unit of government of the State or of any county, unit, special district or other political subdivision of government.

(b) The public records and public information compiled by the agencies of North Carolina government or its subdivisions are the property of the people. Therefore, it is the policy of this State that the people may obtain copies of their public records and public information free or at minimal cost unless otherwise specifically provided by law. As used herein, “minimal cost” shall mean the actual cost of reproducing the public record or public information. (1935, c. 265, s. 1; 1975, c. 787, s. 1; 1995, c. 388, s. 1.)

Coming Monday: The Spoon

The Sermon I’ve Never Forgotten

When I was growing up in Charlotte Brother Dave and I went to First Baptist Church on North Tryon Street, three blocks from the Square.

Good address now, but not so good in the 1950’s. It got a lot better, however, when local government bought and tore down dilapidated buildings in that block, next to the church, and built a gorgeous public library.

Dr. C. C. Warren
Dr. C. C. Warren

Our pastor, Dr. C.C. Warren, who was president of the Southern Baptist Convention in 1956-57, was in favor of the library, of course. But he was against liquor. And the new library had been built with liquor taxes.

Dr. Warren thought that was a mistake and he said so in a sermon he called: “Doing the Right Thing The Wrong Way.”

Even then I did not agree with his views on alcohol, or the use of alcohol taxes, but I was struck by the notion that you could do the right thing the wrong way. I didn’t know until much later that that is a recurrent theme in the Bible, in the Old and New Testaments.

His sermon didn’t alter my views on alcohol but it has caused me to stop on many occasions and ask myself: OK, I’m pretty sure this is the right thing to do, but is this the right way to do it?

NOTE 

I’ve heard a lot of sermons over the years but the words spoken from a pulpit that I remember best, and have thought most about, came from a woman’s testimony. Her name was June Baker and she was a member of Green Pines Baptist Church in Knightdale, North Carolina.

“I’m a fool for Jesus,” she said. “Who — or what — are you a fool for?”

Coming Friday: The Endless Battle