Daniel Lathrop of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer penned an interesting piece about a paralegal who has been taking on the powers to be in Oregon. From his article:
Arthur West, 47, of Olympia is a gadfly representing himself in the case, doing battle with an experienced legal team that includes a member of the Washington State Sunshine Committee, tasked with eliminating exemptions to the public records act.
His case against the Association of Washington Cities tests the reach of a decade-old court decision that the very-similar Washington Association of Counties is a public agency. A victory for West would expand the reach of the state’s open government laws and would be a blow to a variety of groups that provide services to and lobby for local governments but operate largely outside of public scrutiny.
A representative of the state’s newspapers, which often rely on public records and meetings laws to give the public a window on government, criticized the cities for fighting West.
“I don’t see how they could deny him,” said Rowland Thompson, head of Allied Daily Newspapers of Washington. The Seattle P-I is a member of Thompson’s group.
“It’s all public money, so I don’t see how they can make the claim that they can withhold” records, Thompson said.
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