HoodaThunk?

A bit over a week ago the Roanoke Times took the extremely controversial step of acquiring and publishing the entire database of people who have been issued concealed weapons permits by the state of Virginia. Not just names, mind you, but the full address of those people as well. Obviously operating under the impression that everyone who has sought such a permit is just some Dirty Harry wannabe, the Times provided the names and locations of people who had these permits to protect themselves against abusive spouses and criminal elements. People who had acquired these permits as part of their jobs as security personnel or law enforcement. People who had good reasons to not have everyone and their brothers know their home addresses. All were lumped together in the Times’ perspective and were owed no consideration for their privacy.

I wrote about the issue when it came to my attention and took note that, on the same day, a call was made to reconsider whether the information in that database should be publicly available. Via the local blog From On High, I found this editorial in yesterday’s Roanoke Times where the paper apologies, but bristles anyway at the treatment it received. At the risk of this becoming a Fisking, I’ve got some comments along the way:

The difficulty we’ve faced since is how to respond to the rational objections without validating the abusive tactics and attacks waged against this newspaper and the columnist who wrote a piece linked to the database.

Amid the firestorm of criticism, we’ve re-examined our decision-making process and reflected on the valid criticisms.

We’ve come to some conclusions.

First, we had a legal right to post the database. These were public records, legally obtained.

No one who seriously examined this situation ever disputed that. The records are very clearly available to the public and it’s clearly legal for a paper to publish records that are available to the public at large. What this raises is not a red flag that papers shouldn’t be permitted to publish public records, rather it’s raising the question of whether these specific records should be public records at all.

We gave insufficient thought and discussion to the potential that crime victims, law enforcement officers and domestic violence victims might be put at risk if their addresses were published.

Though many of our critics believe that the database handed burglars a shopping list of households with guns and abusers a list of their victims, no one can point to a single incident where similar publications led to a crime.

But we didn’t know that until after the database was published. The potential for harm is something we should have given far greater thought to in making the decision.

For our failure to do so, The Roanoke Times apologizes.

Right to this point, the Times is showing a stellar performance in how an apology is done. They clearly understand the issues in question and where they went horribly wrong. I’d like to also point out that I believe strongly that they didn’t just dismiss these concerns. Their problem was that they didn’t even consider them and, I suspect, that’s because their pre-conceived notions and their agenda didn’t even permit the possibility of these concerns existing.

We also regret that there was not a more compelling public purpose — beyond illustrating how the Freedom of Information Act works — behind the decision to post the database.

There are vital reasons these records should remain open.

But those reasons were not well illuminated — or even particularly well served — by the publication of the entire database.

While I appreciate the apology, I’m a bit taken aback that their stated purpose in publishing tens of thousands of names and addresses of people who weren’t given the chance to argue against what amounted to a vast invasion of their privacy was to merely demonstrate the FoIA. There were no other records or documents that could have been used to make this demonstration? How about the minutes of a particular committee meeting? Say – for example – the meeting where the transportation bill was being discussed? The editor says there are vital reasons for these records to remain open. The admission that those reasons were not illuminated – and remain not well illuminated, I’d add – is the largest understatement I’ve heard this month.

The sole reason given by the paper is that the public should be able to monitor how well the various counties and cities screen the applicants for these permits. Nowhere in this editorial, or anywhere else I’ve read, is it explained how having the name and address of a given individual allows me to monitor the performance of the permitting agencies in conducting the screening process. Even if I were to find someone on this list that I knew, personally, how am I expected to have the access to their criminal records in order to determine whether or not the screening went well? The Times writes as though the mere access to their name and address will ensure accuracy in the screening process and proper oversight of the permitting agencies. That information does nothing but tell me that they issued the permit. Period.

I applaud the Times’ desire to engage the public in governmental oversight. Their actions in this matter did not foster such engagement, did not enhance such oversight, and frankly damaged the whole concept of allowing public access to records where a specific person’s info is available.

I mentioned before that I thought the Times was doing an admirable job in issuing this apology. Unfortunately, they didn’t stop there. The reaction that the Times brought from the public was, shall we say, passionate. We in the blogosphere are well familiar with this kind of reaction and the nature of commentary from people vehemently opposed to what we write. Apparently, the Times hasn’t gotten with the times on this matter.

So, yes, we made mistakes. The process for vetting this decision was not as thorough as it should have been.

Those mistakes, though, in no way justify the outrageous and threatening nature of much of the response. Very early on, a rational discussion of this issue became all but impossible.

I don’t know what letters they received but I can imagine there were people making serious threats. I, too, don’t condone that. I would like to say, however, that you don’t walk up to someone, poke them in the eye, and then complain that that someone doesn’t seem to want to engage in “a rational discussion of [the] issue…” The commentary they drew was drawn because they were careless , literally. Their attitude was that people who want to be licensed to carry concealed weapons aren’t due the consideration of what happens when they’re pushed out into the middle of the public square and identified, by name and address, with the obvious intimation that they’re guilty of some character flaw.

I’ve already said that publishing this data was not necessary to demonstrate the FoIA. That’s obvious to any rational individual. To select this data specifically shows a purpose beyond that, and it’s not unreasonable to think that the purpose was intimidate and ridicule. That people who are exposed to intimidation and ridicule would respond aggressively is no surprise. I don’t condone threats or personal invective in those responses and I feel sorry for the Times employees that had to bear the brunt of their management’s decisions. Without knowing the content of those comments, I can’t say
whether the response was proportionate to the offense.

I hope that the paper was sincere when they say that they recognize they made a mistake and that they’ll strive not to make it again. I would also hope that the paper takes this issue to heart and examines the underlying assumptions they made when this particular mistake was made. Lastly, I’ll also throw in my hope that the people who were wronged by the paper’s mistake suffer no serious consequence from it. I truly hope…