Some would portray the struggle against closing some records in Utah as a battle between good and evil.
On one side: Those wanting openness, transparency and accountability to the public.
On the other side: Those wanting to operate out of back rooms, hide their doings from the public, and make secret deals and alliances.
But, those favoring HB477 -- the legislation closing some records -- cannot be judged so harshly. I do not know whether the bad motivations I just mentioned are behind some of them, but I certainly believe good motivations are behind many of them. They seek for privacy, and privacy can be a worthy goal. They seek to avoid an overly strenuous burden of tracing out old records.
Some must surely want their texting back and forth protected as they know being in the information-gathering stage often means expressing test opinions, if they can be called that -- opinions tossed out to see what stands against them. It involves asking questions that might seem silly. Someone once said no questions are stupid, but when someone is looking for something to hang you on -- and all politicians have someone who fits that description -- most questions can be made to look stupid.
There is at least one more good reason behind HB477. Those favoring it seek to protect the confidences of constituents who approach them for input.
Those, all, are good motivators.
So, closing off some records through HB477, or leaving them open? Sometimes it is not a choice not between good and bad, but between good and good.
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