Not everyone agrees
Sunshine has been a big topic this week. Chattanoogans want it instead of the recent gloomy weather, several Hamilton County commissioners don't want it in their deliberations and two state legislators want more of it when it comes to the meetings of public hospital officials.
Fortunately, if briefly, the weather has cooperated. But Hamilton County commissioners will have to live with -- or violate in private -- the state's Open Meetings Act that keeps their discussions in front of the public. They will, that is, unless they ask state legislators to change the law. But given the fact that state Sen. Todd Gardenhire and state Rep. Mike Carter have filed a bill asking the General Assembly to close a loophole that allows public hospitals to meet in private when they discuss "marketing strategies" and "strategic plans," that might be a no-go.
It's understandable when County Commissioner Greg Beck says "the Sunshine Law stinks" because commissioners can't have a private discussion about what many would say are matters of little consequence in the whole scope of county government, but the tiniest crack in that law opens the door for even more of the backroom deals that some say are a matter of routine. Better to keep things as they are, Commissioner, whether it stinks or not.
And, while the loophole for public hospitals also makes sense for some reasons, Gardenhire and Carter might get traction with their bill because the discussion of "strategic plans" can cover a lot of area when it comes to hospital policy. Believing they were burned on what they think was Erlanger hospital's recent private discussion of $1.7 million in bonuses, they see the cure as a little more sunshine.
Freedom depends on whose it is
Friday was proclaimed Religious Freedom Day by President Barack Obama, but former Atlanta Fire Chief Kelvin Cochran wouldn't be out of line thinking it didn't apply to him.
Cochran is the longtime public servant who was fired from his job earlier this month for holding the view that sex (which includes homosexuality) outside of marriage is sinful. He detailed those views in a book he wrote for a men's Bible study and first had to serve a one-month suspension without pay in November, was publicly chastised and then ordered to go to sensitivity training.
Ironically, while the former fire chief was being punished for his views, the president, in his annual proclamation for Religious Freedom Day, talked about the country's religious freedom, which "protects the right of every person to practice their faith how they choose ... free from persecution and fear. ... As heirs to this proud legacy of liberty, we must remain vigilant in our efforts to safeguard these freedoms."
Cochran, who was buoyed earlier this week by hundreds of people in a show of support at the Georgia capitol building, said Christians should have the same rights as other groups.
"The LGBT members of our community have a right to be able to express their views and convictions about sexuality and deserve to be respected for their position without hate or discrimination," he said. "But Christians also have a right to express our belief regarding our faith and be respected for our position without hate and without discrimination. In the United States, no one should be vilified, hated or discriminated against for expressing their beliefs."
Money and Kings
What a shame the actual birthday -- Jan. 15 -- of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was filled with the news of yet another spat among the remaining King children about their late father's possessions. At issue this time is Dr. King's 1964 Nobel Peace Prize and his traveling Bible. His sons, Martin Luther King III and Dexter Scott King, want the items to be transferred to the estate's possession, while his daughter, Bernice King, wants to keep them out of it.
Bernice King, who said in a public statement last year that their father "must be turning in his grave" over his children's squabbles, contends her father gave the Nobel medal to her mother as a gift. And she controls their mother's estate.
Among earlier dealings, the children sought to sell their father's personal papers for up to $30 million in 2006, but a group of philanthropists and business leaders stepped in to buy them for an undisclosed sum and donate them to the civil rights leader's alma mater, Morehouse College. And Bernice and Martin III had previously sued Dexter, claiming he had improperly taken money from the estate of their mother and transferred it to his own company. After he countersued, the matter was settled quietly before a trial.
The elder King, in fact, spoke about the dangers of money on more than one occasion.
"There is the danger in such a system that men will become so involved in the money getting process," he said in a 1953 sermon, "that they will unconsciously forget to pursue those great eternal values which make life worth living."