The Brainerd City Council deserves to be recognized for the positive action they took on Dec. 2, 2019.
The council corrected a mistake they made when they appointed a new member.
They didn't document their votes, you see, but have since made the correction.
Please understand that nothing nefarious was going on when this mistake occurred.
Secret voting is fine, as long as that public body documents its votes.
ADVERTISEMENT
This recent correction by the city council should serve as a teaching moment for all local units of government.
Of course, in order to serve as that teaching moment for others, it would have needed to have been reported on.
There was, however, nothing from this newspaper.
Considering that our local newspaper brags about being the "public's watchdog" and how they report on things as trivial as a turkey bingo event, you would think the so-called watchdogs would be barking if the votes of elected officials weren't documented when the voting occurred.
Since the correction by the council, queries have been submitted to Dispatch editors, publishers and reporters, asking if they feel the public has a right to know how their elected officials vote.
So far, there's been nary a response from any of them.
When this concern was first brought to some city council members' attention, there was no hesitation. They simply made the correction.
Once again, though, if the watchdog reporters were keeping an eye out for the public's interest, all they would've needed to do was make a simple request for an accounting of each city council member's vote.
ADVERTISEMENT
And that, my friends, would have taken care of the mistake before it ever occurred in the first place.
Jeff Czeczok
Brainerd
