Opinion
4A
Tuesday, May 18, 2021
Our View
Another push
in Oregon
government for
more secrecy
haring someone’s personal information
with intent to harm them could soon get
you sued in Oregon. A bill in the Oregon
Legislature would permit a lawsuit for what’s com-
monly called doxxing.
The bill may help fill a gap in Oregon law.
What’s worrying is a proposed amendment that
would create more secrecy in Oregon government.
House Bill 3047 has more detail than we will
summarize here. It ticks off a long list of things
it defines as “personal information,” including
address, email address, phone number, photographs
of children, identification of children’s school
and more. It says if a defendant with the intent to
harass, injure or stalk knowingly discloses such
information and knew the person didn’t want the
information disclosed and a plaintiff was harassed,
injured or stalked, a plaintiff can seek damages.
You can read the bill yourself on the Legislature’s
website.
One important thing to note: The bill does not
specify the personal information disclosed is or is
not already publicly available. So it may not matter
if anyone could find the information if they went
looking. What can matter is the intent of the dis-
closure and if the person was harassed, injured or
stalked and if a reasonable person would have been,
as well.
Let’s look at the amendment. Members of the
public and journalists can get into battles with gov-
ernment agencies over public records. The pro-
posed amendment aims to expand the list of things
exempted from disclosure.
The Oregonian reported the “amendment was
introduced on behalf of the League of Oregon
Cities.” Scott Winkels, the organization’s lobbyist
told that newspaper: “We were just trying to align
the language to what a lot of people in the state had
always felt like it meant.”
Part of the amendment may do that. It also would
throw a shadow over much government activity.
Just one thing the amendment does is exempt
from disclosure communications within a public
body or between public bodies if “they cover other
than purely factual materials and are preliminary to
any final agency determination of policy or action.”
The communications may still be released, but a
member of the public might have to go to court to
get them.
It’s easier to understand with an example. An
Oregon Secretary of State audit found in January
2018 that Oregon’s Department of Human Services
has been slow, indecisive and inadequate in fixing
recurring problems with foster care. In April 2018,
The Bulletin in Bend asked DHS what it was doing
to make progress. When The Observer’s sister
paper didn’t get a response, it made a public records
request for DHS emails connected to our request.
It turned out DHS had written up a memo to
answer the questions. The Bulletin only ever
received the memo because of the public records
request. Other emails the paper received showed the
agency was more concerned with how the informa-
tion might be seen than informing the public what it
was doing. It wanted to hold off releasing anything
and roll it into a media campaign.
That’s an example of how your state government
works. Its priority can be controlling information,
not informing the public. And under the amend-
ment such as the one to House Bill 3047, we may
never have received those emails.
The amendment doesn’t simply line up state law
with what people think state law says. It’s also a
move to suppress the people’s ability to understand
how their government behaves behind the scenes.
S
Other Views
There’s value in work, like it or not
RICH MANIERI
JOURNALIST AND AUTHOR
he disappointing April jobs
report should surprise abso-
lutely no one, given we now
have a government more interested
in providing incentives for people not
to work rather than paving the way to
gainful employment. There is some-
thing to be said for and gained putting
in an honest day’s work and collecting
a paycheck.
When I was a teenager, my mother
worked as my talent agent. She landed
me two busboy jobs, a few babysitting
gigs and a handful of snow-shoveling
and grass-mowing jobs in the neigh-
borhood. But her biggest score was the
Enchanted Village.
It was a small store in a strip mall
that sold Christmas items and was
owned and operated by the meanest
man I have ever met. I’ll call him
Wally.
One afternoon, my mother walked
into the shop and asked Wally if he
needed anyone after school. They
talked for a while. My mother worked
her magic. It was the first and only
time in my life that I was hired without
being interviewed.
You would think a guy who spent
his days around twinkling lights and
snow globes would have a bit of the
Christmas spirit about him. But Wally
saw Christmas as if it were a bully
T
Letters
Coach Labarda will be missed
on the basketball court
I first met coach Carlito Labarda Jr.
in February 2019 at my first Eastern
Oregon University men’s basketball
game. I had just moved here from
Atlanta, Georgia, and was wearing a
University of Georgia Bulldog shirt. I
who pulled his pants down every
afternoon at recess. It was his mortal
enemy, a nemesis, a burden to be
endured.
Wally was in his 40s. He had a beer
belly and a big, wild, salt and pepper
moustache that seemed to be trying to
overcome his entire face. His most dis-
tinguishing feature, however, was his
absolute hatred of anyone under 21.
One day, I was on my knees
stocking shelves with boxes of red
satin Christmas balls.
“Reverse them,” Wally ordered as
he stood over me with his arms folded.
Reverse what? I didn’t know what
he was talking about.
“Reverse them!”
“Reverse” seemed like an odd
word. My brain defined “reverse” as
to move backward. I think that’s what
threw me. I looked at Wally. I didn’t
say anything but I hoped my look told
him I didn’t know what he wanted
me to do or how he wanted me to
“reverse” the red balls. He didn’t take
the bait.
“Reverse them!” he yelled.
I figured I’d better do something.
So I took each box of balls and turned
it around so the front of the box was
facing the back of the shelf.
When Wally yelled “No!” or
“Stop!” he wasn’t just barking an
order. It was more desperate than that,
almost like he was watching some hor-
rible tragedy. Not being able to put up
with my stupidity any longer, Wally
grabbed the boxes of red balls and put
them on the floor.
“Reverse them! Reverse them!
Moron.”
He took boxes of green balls from
the shelf and put them where I had
been stacking red balls, and he put
the red balls where the green ones
were.
Yes, I hated the job. Yes, Wally
was insane. But it wasn’t the last job I
would hate nor would Wally be my last
combustible and unreasonable boss. I
needed to learn how to deal with bad
jobs and bad bosses. And, when it was
over, I took my paycheck to the bank
and deposited it — like an adult.
There are scores of jobs, right now,
in the U.S. — well-paying jobs — that
remain unfilled.
“I hear from too many employers
throughout our state who can’t find
workers. Nearly every sector in our
economy faces a labor shortage,” Mon-
tana’s Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte
said last week. Gianforte announced
his state is no longer accepting the fed-
eral government’s extra unemploy-
ment payments.
Hopefully, there are more gover-
nors out there like Gianforte, who
understand that paying able-bodied
Americans to stay home is bad for
business, and that it’s even worse for
Americans.
———
Rich Manieri is a
Philadelphia-born journalist and
author. He is currently a professor of
journalism at Asbury University in
Kentucky. You can reach him at
manieri2@gmail.com.
was sitting behind the bench and after
the game I spoke with the coach and
told him that was a great win. He said
to come to his office the next day and
he would get me a EOU shirt to wear
instead of that Georgia shirt.
So the next day I met him at his
office and we talked a few minutes
about his coaching career. I asked
him what is was like to coach against
Bobby Knight of Indiana when he
coached at Purdue under Gene Keady.
He said it was always entertaining for
him.
Whether I saw him at Denny’s after
a game or shopping at Safeway, he
always had time to say hello and ask
how I was doing. He will be missed on
the court, and I wish him the very best
in his future.
Robert Beck
Island City