Taped on Friday, December 17. The latest Reporters’ Roundtable edition of Iowa Press would have been essentially useless as far as informing the public about issues had it not been for Kathy Obradovich.  While the others wasted their time primarily on declaring which races will be competitive and which will not be, dropping political factoids, and wondering benignly what the Republicans might do on taxes, Kathy Obradovich went to work bringing up the problem of lack of transparency in state government and explaining to viewers why it is important.

Asked by O. Kay Henderson what she expects to cover in 2022 Obradovich wasted no time informing the viewing audience of something going on that they need to know.

“Our ability to report on issues through the governors office and state government… this is something we’ve all experienced the non-compliance of the governor’s office with the Iowa open meetings and records law. There have been at least 2 lawsuits filed – my organization is involved in one of those that was filed this month along with the Freedom of Information Council and some other media outlets. ..we will see how that plays out in the courts… But I just want to put in a plug for the open meetings and records law. It’s very important to democracy. If people can’t reliably get records from state government – not just media – people walking in off the street to their local school board or to their local city council… if they cannot get access to public records in a reliable way they have to rely on what their elected officials are telling them about what they’re doing and that’s really difficult for democracy.” – Kathy Obradovich