I think I should clarify something. I am not at all opposed to spreading
the word through proper channels about this bureaucratic attempt to deny
public access to vital records in a nearby state. There are right ways and
wrong ways, however. The message should have been sent to the general
genealogy maillists for the various regions involved. This would have
reached many more genealogists, and would have been an entirely appropriate
use of those lists. The XXGen-L lists, on the other hand, are usually
closed to the public and reserved strictly for USGW project business. This
is the way these lists are operated in nearly every state GenWeb project.
To send a message with no bearing on project operations to nine different
states's XXGen lists was not appropriate.
Passing similar non-WAGenWeb messages to WAGen-L from other lists,
including the so-called "all" list, would be equally inappropriate.
In the case of wagen-l, this list is most often used by Celia or myself to
communicate with and make announcements to the county coordinators. It is
also available for the county coordinators to discuss amongst themselves
questions about webpage design and the like. The list is not designed to be
used for general genealogy matters or queries. For general genealogy
matters and queries in Washington, we have several excellent regional
lists. Covering western Washington is PSROOTS-L, for central and eastern
Washington WADOUGLA-L. EWANDI-L covers far eastern Washington and Northern
Idaho, and Washington-L is a statewide general genealogy list.
I hope this clears up any questions. I likewise hope that Montana does not
carry out the proposal to close these records.
Thank you,
Kevin Fraley
At 07:27 AM 9/8/99 -0300, bookstorelady wrote:
Hi.
I find it very interesting that Montana is trying to pass restrictive
legislation. What goes on in other states is important to me.
She might have been better served to have sent this to -ALL and asked
CC's to pass it through the state lists and, of course, better use
<snipping> would have presented her case better...
But, on the whole, I think I needed to know this information and I
appreciate her effort to get it to me.
Darilee