Investigation request reaffirms the value of the press

Each and every day, breaking news stories are delivered to the public from a variety of news organizations around the world. While some stories are global, others are hyper-local, and yet the stated purpose of the reporting source remains the same: releasing information to the public with its best interests in mind.
Reporters, along with their editors and their sources, spend countless hours in newsrooms debating the merits and needs of covering certain issues. Often, that short news flash that briefly hits the airwaves – and sometimes, just sometimes, results in resignations or causes a sponsorship scandal – is the result of numerous telephone calls, intensive online research, the filing of access to information requests, and a prodding for details from multiple levels of government officials and their staff.
Last October, Alexandria-based newspaper The Glengarry News filed a request with the Township of North Glengarry for an investigation into a year’s worth of its closed, in-camera meetings. The newspaper’s request stemmed from the fact that one of its journalists received word from a township councillor regarding a $760,000 surplus, but could not find any record of it in minutes released to the public.
Such a move would have required both an up-to-date observation of the municipal council’s actions, over the course of that year, as well as a significant understanding of the township’s responsibilities vis-à-vis payments received – whether such a payment comes in the form of a class-action lawsuit settlement or simply an average taxpayer’s annual cheque.
This is precisely the type of situation where newspapers, and individual journalists, are shown to be an invaluable resource to the public. For, if not for the work of such individuals – as well as publishers willing to support investigative journalism worldwide – these stories and their underlying issues would simply not find their way to the mainstream.
Whether or not the lack of disclosure on the part of township staff was an “administrative oversight,” as the mayor suggested, the fact remains that the disclosure of this particular $760,000 sum was far from insignificant to the public interest. The closed meeting investigator highlighted this very point in his March 15 report.
Furthermore, North Glengarry’s handling of the settlement – and the resulting investigation – raises two critical questions: a) how, or why, did experienced township staff and council members fail to notice the “administrative oversight” in not publicly disclosing three-quarters of a million dollars, and b) why was the matter only corrected two weeks after a request for investigation was officially filed by The Glengarry News?
Again, the above questions were indeed addressed by the investigator’s report, yet the most significant player in this matter is undoubtedly the press; the questions raised by the investigator, and his suggestions, would not have come to light if not for the initial request.
It is now up to council members to decide whether they will heed the advice of the report, though comments made following the brief release of the information to the public, at the council meeting April 12, offered little hope that the council had plans to do so.
“I think the concern here is that they had an opportunity to take the recommendations, to be as transparent as they can be, and yet they seemed to dismiss it during the meeting,” said The Glengarry News publisher Jeff Korenko. “We weren’t looking for wrongdoing, just looking for answers – and disclosure.”
Ask yourself this: if newspapers and journalists stop searching for these answers, who will fill in for them? - J.B.