Northwest Arkansas likes to go out to eat.
Just check out the next time a restaurant opens how crazy the immediate reaction is. When the Texas-based Whataburger chain opened a location on Fayetteville's Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, the resulting traffic jam required police to help direct traffic, for hours.
What’s the point?
Erosion of open government measures damages the public’s ability to keep a watchful eye on the work done on the public’s behalf, and with its tax dollars.
Food is a form of entertainment, as our average American waist line demonstrates.
For decades, readers of this newspaper and other publications have enjoyed a glimpse into the world of restaurants through the collection of advertising and promotion taxes. The taxes, if adopted by local voters, are collected on prepared meals and on lodging. In return for this local taxation, communities can then promote themselves to potential visitors and attract them to come spend their money in shops and, in a circle of life fashion, in those same restaurants, hotels and motels which are required to collect those taxes.
Unlike income tax and other government taxation, the amounts paid by local businesses for the purposes of advertising and promotion have, since their creation, been open to public inspection. So for years and years, readers saw lists of the restaurants that paid the highest amounts, which translated into which restaurants were documenting the most revenue on a month to month bases. In Fayetteville, it was often the Chick-Fil-A. In Bentonville, it was often the Walmart Home Office cafeteria.
Springdale doesn't have a advertising and promotion tax, but the prospect of it was enough that Arkansas now has adopted the Micah Neal Asset Protection Act of 2015.
Well, that may not be the formal title. In state government, it's known as Act 1102, sponsored by Neal, who also happens to be a Republican state legislator. He also owns Neal's Cafe, a Springdale restaurant made popular by copious amounts of good food and pies worth feeling miserable for later.
Neal's measure slammed the door on the public nature of the tax information, creating yet another veil of secrecy in government Republicans often say they don't trust to do things well or right. Protection of Neal's business trumped transparency in government, the lawmaker said.
"It's not anyone's business what a private business owner is grossing every month," Neal said recently. "Your friends, your neighbors, your competition -- you don't need them to know how much you're making."
The public nature of government -- at least what's left of it -- is geared toward another concern. With all the power government has to take money, to enforce laws, to even take away an individuals liberty, it's vital the public have as much information as possible to make sure government is doing its job well, accurately and fairly. Shielding information from public view helps to thwart that.
We're certainly not sympathetic to privacy, but it's also worth noting the businesses that have been collecting and reporting advertising and promotion taxes for years haven't been harmed in the least by the revelations of the taxes they've paid. Neal's measure was about his comfort level, not about the broader public interests.
What's the harm? The reality is every time some lawmaker chips away at the transparency of government, he's empowering that government and those who might have the power to use government inappropriately. And it's disappointing how easily these measures eroding the public nature of government are passed. Neal's proposal garnered only a few votes of opposition.
Neal was among those who also pushed through legislation to exempt from public disclosure the state's list of people permitted to carry concealed handguns. Again, the list had been public for years, but lawmakers reacted to one publication's decision to publish the names of permit holders in another state. Secrecy in government was the better option, they suggested.
Another lawmaker convinced colleagues to exempt the names of children involved in traffic accidents from public records. Why? Because some of their parents get letters of solicitation from lawyers. Rather than parents simply throwing those letters in the trash, lawmakers saw fit to hide more information from the public. The records have been open to public inspection for decades, but one advocate of government secrecy succeeds in creating more of it.
Voting for secrecy in government implies a high level trust in government. Open government advocates prefer a bit of a skeptical approach. When Ronald Reagan suggested the United States "trust, but verify" in its agreements with the Soviet Union, he captured the best approach to government in general. But verification is made extraordinarily more difficult with each peace of data or information lawmakers see fit to hide from public view.
The trend is dangerous. Transparency in government serves the public's interest. Secrecy doesn't.
Commentary on 08/26/2015