Hi. I just signed up for TCW and read some articles. There are some very valid points being made in some of these articles.
However, I am unable to identify who — what individuals — make up TCW and who the authors are of the articles. Transparency is an apparently a big issue with TCW, so would those folks who comprise the TCW group and those who submit writings please identify themselves or guide me to where I can find your names. I assume you folks are Talent residents but do not know. Thanks. Todd Hoener, Talent resident.
Thanks for reading and subscribing Todd! This is a fully anonymous publication, no names to point you to. There is one person writing (that's me, long-time Talent folk) and several other people who live in Talent or very close to city limits that help fact check, research, gather records, suggest topics, and review/proof the posts. This is not a solo venture, which is why I use the we/us in the essays, but it's also not multiple authors writing the articles. Not yet anyway... It would be great to be able to open it up to other Talent watchdog writers though, and the plan was always to try to do that eventually. If you or anyone else reading is interested in submitting a piece please email us. The more Talent voices the better! If that were to happen we'd come up with a way to differentiate between authors.
I get that some people may not find the TCW Report legitimate because there are no names attached, and that's fine. We knew going into it that the anonymity would be a problem for some readers and we’d get this kind of pushback. But we chose anonymity anyway to protect ourselves against personal and professional retaliation, exclusion, and attacks from people with direct and institutionally-backed power over our careers and daily lives. People who have already shown a willingness to strike way too hard, and way too personally, at critics and dissenters.
You’re right that transparency is central to what TCW is pushing for, but there’s an important distinction to make about that. Government transparency means that public officials - those who make the rules, have actual power over our lives and livelihoods, and decide how our money is spent - have an obligation to disclose their actions, decisions, and conflicts of interest. That’s the standard we press hard on because without it we can’t hold our leaders accountable, and without accountability local government becomes too vulnerable to personal incentives driving the decision making.
Private citizens however, even those of us who write critically about our City government, have a right to participate in civic discourse this way without exposing ourselves to personal retaliation or professional harm. We do not have the same power nor the same obligation to the public as elected officials do, and holding us to the same disclosure standards just doesn’t make sense. A citizen watchdog blog and an elected City Council are just not the same type of entity requiring the same level of transparency.
Regardless, I think that whatever we end up losing in institutional validation (and some readership) by being anonymous we make up for in the freedom we have to expose the truth about what’s happening in the institutions. I hope that readers can judge the TCW Report on its own merits, i.e. the depth of the research, the strength of the arguments, and not on what’s known about the person writing it, and I hope that we will earn more reader trust over time by consistently doing good work here.
Hi. I just signed up for TCW and read some articles. There are some very valid points being made in some of these articles.
However, I am unable to identify who — what individuals — make up TCW and who the authors are of the articles. Transparency is an apparently a big issue with TCW, so would those folks who comprise the TCW group and those who submit writings please identify themselves or guide me to where I can find your names. I assume you folks are Talent residents but do not know. Thanks. Todd Hoener, Talent resident.
Thanks for reading and subscribing Todd! This is a fully anonymous publication, no names to point you to. There is one person writing (that's me, long-time Talent folk) and several other people who live in Talent or very close to city limits that help fact check, research, gather records, suggest topics, and review/proof the posts. This is not a solo venture, which is why I use the we/us in the essays, but it's also not multiple authors writing the articles. Not yet anyway... It would be great to be able to open it up to other Talent watchdog writers though, and the plan was always to try to do that eventually. If you or anyone else reading is interested in submitting a piece please email us. The more Talent voices the better! If that were to happen we'd come up with a way to differentiate between authors.
I get that some people may not find the TCW Report legitimate because there are no names attached, and that's fine. We knew going into it that the anonymity would be a problem for some readers and we’d get this kind of pushback. But we chose anonymity anyway to protect ourselves against personal and professional retaliation, exclusion, and attacks from people with direct and institutionally-backed power over our careers and daily lives. People who have already shown a willingness to strike way too hard, and way too personally, at critics and dissenters.
You’re right that transparency is central to what TCW is pushing for, but there’s an important distinction to make about that. Government transparency means that public officials - those who make the rules, have actual power over our lives and livelihoods, and decide how our money is spent - have an obligation to disclose their actions, decisions, and conflicts of interest. That’s the standard we press hard on because without it we can’t hold our leaders accountable, and without accountability local government becomes too vulnerable to personal incentives driving the decision making.
Private citizens however, even those of us who write critically about our City government, have a right to participate in civic discourse this way without exposing ourselves to personal retaliation or professional harm. We do not have the same power nor the same obligation to the public as elected officials do, and holding us to the same disclosure standards just doesn’t make sense. A citizen watchdog blog and an elected City Council are just not the same type of entity requiring the same level of transparency.
Regardless, I think that whatever we end up losing in institutional validation (and some readership) by being anonymous we make up for in the freedom we have to expose the truth about what’s happening in the institutions. I hope that readers can judge the TCW Report on its own merits, i.e. the depth of the research, the strength of the arguments, and not on what’s known about the person writing it, and I hope that we will earn more reader trust over time by consistently doing good work here.