Holding public officials accountable.  Encouraging the honest ones and weeding out the dishonest ones.  Those are some of our responsibilities as citizens.

One way for citizens to hold local officials accountable is to simply watch them — closely.   Refuse to tolerate any inaction or illegal actions, and demand the questionable or outright illegal actions be investigated and, if warranted,  prosecuted.    That’s how some corrupt local officials were caught up in the Tennessee Waltz.

There are other ways to let officials know that the citizens are not asleep at the switch.  Attend public meetings.  Take notes.  Review meeting minutes and videos and compare the minutes with videos.  You will sometimes be surprised to find that what you heard and saw at the meeting or on the video is not necessarily completely and accurately reflected in meeting minutes.  When that happens, it’s fair to ask “Is the Public Record Accurate?“.  Careless inaccuracy is one thing — it can and should be corrected.  Intentional inaccuracy in any public record is wrong, it may be criminal, and it must never be tolerated.  

Yes, watchdogging public officials and their conduct is time-consuming.  We used to rely on a free press (particularly newspapers) to do that, but no longer.  The economics of news gathering and delivery, the biases and financial conflicts of interest of news media owners and publishers, and the willingness of the public to tolerate inaccurate, incomplete, and untimely journalism have contributed to the erosion of media effectiveness as watchdogs.  This is true locally, regionally, and nationally.  

If we want honest government, it is up to us.  Standing around in a circle and pointing to the guy on gal on our right and saying, “It’s up to him (or her) is no longer acceptable.  It is up to us.  All of us.