So it's bad enough to be in a state where representatives walk out of meetings if they don't like the questions, and where the Governor skulks around the state in secret and will only speak to those folks who are of a like mind. It's also deplorable to have the state government change our laws to become less responsive to citizens, and to change the civil service laws to allow more cronyism. But I'm genuinely shocked to find out that we have a state agency with a blacklist of citizens who are not to be responded to, apparently because they either were not nice enough or they asked too many questions.
The Journal-Sentinel reports that the DNR has a "do not respond" list of 16 citizens to whom the agency will not respond unless legally required to by open records laws. I was not surprised to see that there were not big businesses or huge polluters on this list - just plain old citizens who were trying to get help from the agency. Yet another reason to vote out the bums in our legislature who keep working to make us a lesser state, full of corruption and with a government that will only serve big business and special interests. The current DNR is but one example of a formerly strong state agency that has been gutted and turned over to a "Chamber of Commerce" mentality.