In the early 1980s, I accompanied another reporter to the city controller’s office, where we painstakingly looked at every invoice filed in every city department.

We were doing a story about legal fees in the administration of Mayor Win Moses. These were the days before widespread computer record-keeping, and because various departments and funds paid various lawyers, we had to sift through thousands of paper invoices, all filed in various cabinets and drawers. After a couple of days, we had a total, and within a week or two, we had a story informing residents how much of their tax money was going to which lawyers.

Though the Moses administration had been the subject of some unflattering stories, we had unfettered access to the controller’s records.

How much times have changed.

Today, access to city records is strictly limited; the administration is less than forthcoming about far too many aspects of government; and even information that is clearly a matter of public record can be difficult to see.

On Sept. 7, for example, The Journal Gazette – whose reporters are no longer permitted to look through the city’s claims – asked for billing records showing how much money has been paid to lawyers representing the city in the case involving Indiana Michigan Power’s lease of City Light. This is clearly a matter of public interest, and residents of Fort Wayne have every right to see how many of their tax dollars they are paying to which lawyers.

Two days later, the city said it would comply.

Five weeks later, the newspaper is still waiting for those records. Citizens still don’t know how much they are paying the lawyers to wage a debatable fight that has yet to even go to court.

Though a mediator has asked the city and I&M not to comment publicly on their negotiations, that does not prevent the city from releasing clearly public billing records. If Mayor Tom Henry wanted you to know how much of your money was going toward I&M legal fees, his administration would have released the information in a matter of days.

Paul Helmke ended the free access to the controller’s office, but he was a former lawyer for The News-Sentinel and understood that the public has a right to know.

Graham Richard, was less forthcoming and once tried to hide how much the city was paying lawyers to take over the Aqua Indiana northern water utility. His failure to announce a major, $285,000 contract in the waning days of his administration was the main impetus for a bill now before the City Council requiring administrations to inform the council of professional service contracts.

I’ve covered four mayoral administrations while working at The Journal Gazette, and the Henry administration is without question the most secretive. This is especially disappointing coming from a populist mayor.

A fundamental philosophy of the American constitutional form of representative government is that government is the servant of the people and not their master. Accordingly, it is the public policy of the state that all persons are entitled to full and complete information regarding the affairs of government and the official acts of those who represent them as public officials and employees. Providing persons with the information is an essential function of a representative government and an integral part of the routine duties of public officials and employees, whose duty it is to provide the information.

These words are more than a high-minded goal – this is Indiana law. Unfortunately, as officials statewide – not just in the Henry administration – learn more about the details of laws governing open meetings and open records, too many seem to look more for loopholes on how to be secretive rather than reasons to be open.

City police were acting on behalf of the public when an officer shot and killed an unarmed José Baudilio Lemus-Rodriguez on a city street, a shooting captured by police-car cameras. City officials aggressively fought release of the tapes but said the public would see them during the trial of a civil lawsuit brought by Lemus-Rodriguez’ family. Officials said they didn’t want the videotapes released before a trial because it could drive up a verdict award.

By all appearances, though, the city had every intention of avoiding a trial and settling out of court, which is exactly what happened. The city paid $350,000 – a relatively high amount in Indiana. The excuse of avoiding a high payment is gone, but the city still refuses to release those tapes.

That may be the most high-profile effort to hide information from citizens, but it isn’t the only one. An apartment complex is suing the fire department to get records regarding a fatal fire. Henry infamously failed to mention he hired lobbyists to seek a referendum on casino gambling when he announced other gambling-related contracts.

When the City Council voted Sept. 8 to buy a piece of land for the Towpath Trail, the administration refused to reveal the exact location – or the price. Only a week after reporter Dan Stockman formally requested the information did the city release records showing the price and location.

No information is more fundamentally public than how much the city pays to whom and for what.

When the council has to consider a law to pry this information loose, when people have to wait more than five weeks to find out how much the city is paying lawyers in a critical case, citizens should not only worry, they should be appalled.

No one wants military enemies to be alerted in advance to planned U.S. troop movements. No one wants the nuclear launch codes publicized. No one wants the combination of locks protecting stockpiles of chemical weapons to be plastered over the front pages of newspapers.

But officials too often exaggerate possible negative repercussions of making most public information public. In the vast majority of cases, it isn’t the public who will be harmed but the officials who want to keep the secrets.

Time after time in the history of the nation, whenever officials want to conceal government information, they give a high-minded policy reason, but it almost invariably is because that information makes someone look bad. When the information makes them look good, they usually cannot wait to release it.

Richard Nixon, in fighting the release of the Watergate tapes, famously argued that future presidents should be able to tape their conversations without worry they would be made public. The tapes, of course, showed his complicity in the Watergate coverup. This is one of the highest-profile examples, but certainly not the only one.

The federal Freedom of Information Act regulates release of federal government information. President Bill Clinton instructed agencies to release information requested under the law except when it clearly would harm the public; President George W. Bush reversed that instruction, telling agencies to keep information secret unless they had no good excuse.

If knowledge is power, information is empowering. In our republic, citizens may not make day-to-day decisions affecting government, but they have a right to know what those decisions are and to tell elected representatives exactly what they think of those decisions. Even better, citizens should know when their officials are considering a course of action so they can offer ideas beforehand; the health care reform debate is a perfect example.

Ultimately, information gives voters a basis for whom to cast ballots.

Not all elected officials embrace secrecy. County Commissioner Bill Brown has aggressively pushed the commissioners to be more open. Republican County Councilwoman Paula Hughes and former County Councilman Cal Miller did much to make the council more open.

To varying degrees, they get it.

Henry doesn’t.