PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all of my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon, as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.

There is a proposal circulating around the Capitol in Salem these days that makes little sense.

And that is not because of the Senate and House Republican walk-out that now has lasted for just under a week.

It is a public records law change that would give statutory heft to making a so-called public records czar in state government independent of all other authorities.

Dumb.

I say this as a person who has worked with Oregon’s public records laws for about 40 years.

The laws may be complicated, but there is a solid basic proposition that underlies what is in the statutes:  All government records are public unless you can cite a specific statutory exemption that will stand up under scrutiny – often intense scrutiny.

The proposal is to make an individual public records czar (by the way, in my judgment, there should not be such a position) responsible to no one other than himself or herself.

The best option, if there has to be a public records czar, is to make the person report to the governor.  Then, as is the case with other positions in the Executive Branch, the governor or another statewide elected official would be held accountable for performance.

All of this arose because the czar – she was called a “public records advocate” — complained because she reported to the governor and key staff there, for the governor, oversaw her operation, at times telling her what policy to follow.

The advocate\czar, Ginger McCall, cited irreconcilable differences with the governor’s staff over role of the public records advocate, including that she felt pressured by the governor’s administration to advance Brown’s public records policy goals without publicly disclosing who was directing that work.

Of course, then McCall left Salem to head to another government job on the East Coast.  Before she left, said it was important to add language to state law to make clear that “the public records advocate” is independent.

It is not clear, at the moment, whether the bill will pass in the “short session,” especially given the walk-out impasse.

If not, that’s good.

No one manager in state government, no matter the subject, should be given carte blanch to operate as he or she sees fit.  Better to hold an elected official accountable — and that’s what should happen when it comes to public records.