Municipal secrecy

The City of Saint John has taken the position that secrecy is good when it will help a project move ahead. This assertion may be true in the short term and when the public good is surely being served. However when it comes to public private partnerships, such as the one that is apparently leading a development proposal surrounding the construction of a new police station, transparency is key.

The public understands for the most part that all financial details can't be shared. Still the public should find out about municipal projects for the municipality, not from other citizens who have pieced together details from their own dealings with th city and its representatives.

While the project proposed for Saint John's uptown could turn out great, the lack of openness is concerning - especially if the project goes poorly. With so much done in private if the project flops, there may be a lack of benchmarks for citizens to gauge the failure with. This will reduce accountability.

Governments should not go down the path of NB Power seems to be going down. They have recently defended keeping information in private for the sake of following contracts. This public organization has gotten much flack for appearing to hide information from citizens.

It seems dangerous to make decisions in the "corporate best interest" and to assume that this will trickle down into good for the citizens that public institutions are mandated to serve. It could be good if the public does benefit, but when problems arise and the citizens do not benefit for secrecy people feel like they have been betrayed rather than just failed.