POPE’S VIEW: Resolve to be a citizen activist for quality of life (SAR)

Former St. Augustine Record Editorial Page Editor Margo Pope's Christmas column on citizen participation in government. It made the difference in two public interest victories that we celebrated this past week -- the City of St. Augustine Beach's EMBASSY SUITES Splash Park decision uphold in court, and the City of St. Augustine's Confederate Monument contextualization plaques being installed. 

Venceremos!

POPE’S VIEW: Resolve to be a citizen activist for quality of life
Posted Dec 23, 2018 at 2:01 AM
Updated Dec 23, 2018 at 4:54 AM
St. Augustine Record

In another week, when the season of giving and getting wanes, a lot of people will seek new challenges to energize themselves. They’ll write or tap out their New Year’s resolutions. Or, go into the computer and refresh the 2018 list. Forget that!

Those resolutions will be history sooner than later.

Perhaps a better and meaningful option is to become a citizen activist for quality of life in our community.

I spoke recently before two city boards representing the St. Augustine Historical Society Board of Trustees of which I am president. Having been in the back row at most public meetings as a journalist, the idea of being up front and speaking out was thought-provoking and challenging. Weeks before, the Board of Trustees worked out the position paper in support of the new Historic Preservation Master Plan. I touched on the highlights for the city boards’ members who had the position paper in front of them. I answered questions and then, I sat down. The wait to speak was longer than the speaking time itself.

Citizen activists for good government speak up and speak out at every meeting. I noticed in public comment periods in 2018, there were more new speakers. The regulars refreshed their messages, too. I am encouraged by the new speakers and appreciate the veteran ones. They are leading by example. It’s your turn to carry on the legacy of open government.

Open government is well-established as law in Florida. Florida Statues, Chapter 286, Public Business, aka, Government-in-the-Sunshine took effect on July 1, 1967.

The interaction of public speakers at government meeting, takes me back to my days at the hotbed of open government in Florida, the University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications in Gainesville. The Sunshine Law had its beginnings on the UF campus. Some of my professors fought for the law.

I re-tell the story because there are new people arriving all the time. I want them to know how long it took to get it from bill to law. In the late 1950s, then-state Rep. J. Emory “Red” Cross of Gainesville and Alachua County began his efforts. It took five tries before passage after much push from UF J-school professors and its Sigma Delta Chi, national journalism society chapter, and the state newspapers, radio and television companies. SDX is now known as The Society of Professional Journalists.

Cross took up the cause after speaking to the SDX chapter and chatting with two UF professors of journalism, Horance G. “Buddy” Davis Jr., and Hugh Cunningham. As Davis recalled in a 1998 interview for my article on the law’s 30th anniversary, they asked Cross to consider introducing a bill to open government meetings in Florida to the public. They provided the model law that was printed in The Quill, SDX’s national publication. Cross, in a separate interview, told me he used the model law because he said no other state had one.

More than 1100 exemptions exist today since it took effect. But Florida’s core law remains intact, that a government agency, state or local, cannot keep us out of a meeting, unless there is a specific exemption. The agency must state that exemption to the public. Only a few meetings are ever closed, however.

Citizen activists are always present at public meetings and have their say. More citizen activists are emerging as more quality of life issues emerge: overgrowth, heavier traffic, environmental challenges.

A good energizer for citizen activists, seasoned and new, is the First Amendment Foundation’s website (https://floridafaf.org/). Get ready to speak up and speak out in 2019.

Margo C. Pope was associated with The St. Augustine Record for 24 years, retiring in 2012 as The Record’s editorial page editor.