Good government is based on good information.  Many constituents would like to take part in the government of Michigan, but in their busy lives as citizens, experience a lack of timely intercommunication with legislators.   In my opinion, there is a "disconnect" between the needs and wants of elected officials in Lansing and the needs and wants of the citizens of this beautiful state.  A bill comes before the legislature, it is discussed, passed, and then the citizen hears of it on a local television news hour.   Let us change this by improving the dialog between legislators and constituents as follows:

First: we live in the age of technology:  websites of other states in the union explain services and offer direct communication to its citizens.  To be sure, the State of Michigan has such a website to fulfill the so-called "transparency in government", explaining various topics of citizens' interest; namely, status of legislation being considered by the House and Senate.

However, the websites of the States of Missouri and Indiana are ahead of Michigan by offering, among other things, bills and resolutions listed by subject matter, making it very convenient for a taxpayer to review issues for his/her specific needs and to submit an opinion.  The State of Michigan website should be revised to list legislative bills and resolutions (prior to and after passage) by subject matter.

Second:  Local newspapers currently perform a civic responsibility to its subscribers by offering diverse and multi-faceted topics currently exemplified by separate sections such as "Entertainment", "Sports", "Local News", "Classified Ads", "Business Section", to name a few. In many cases, the reader is swamped with stories ranging from trivial celebrity gossip to the useless "filling up newsprint space" stories, none of which fill the need for real information about the issues facing our great state.   In the interest of a better informed constituency for the State of Michigan, a new weekly section titled "Legislation" should be added to the local newspapers.  In my opinion, House and Senate bills and resolutions could be published in the local newspaper(s) 90 days prior to passage by the legislators.  Each bill and/or resolution should fully disclose the following parameters; i.e., its sponsors, what it hopes to achieve, who or what will gain from

its passage, what is the purpose of it,  who to contact in order to submit an opinion, what is the approximate cost if it was enacted, who would pay for it, the deadline date for passage,  what committee has it under consideration, and any other relevant test.

In conclusion, we, the citizens, are the government.  We have a republic.  In a republic, it is essential to inform the public.  This is not a new argument, for even in Paris on January 16, 1787, Thomas Jefferson wrote to Colonel Edward Carrington the following:

"....I am persuaded myself that the good sense of the people will always be found to be the best army.  They may be led astray for a moment, but will soon correct themselves...The way to prevent these irregular inter-positions of the people is to give them full information of their affairs through the channel of the public papers, and to contrive that those papers should penetrate the whole mass of the people.  The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.  But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them....If once  they become inattentive to the public affairs, you and I and Congress and Assemblies, Judges and Governors, shall all become wolves.  It seems to be the law of our general nature, in spite of individual exceptions; and experience declares that man is the only animal which devours his own kind...."

The State of Michigan has the opportunity to lead the way in a rebuilding of public information in at least two levels of public media.