Good government must be open government.

On Wednesday, the Legislature will hear more testimony on two comprehensive open-government bills, SB186 and SB189. Both bills would help move South Dakota out of the dark days of its outdated government records law, but only SB189 would bring the sunshine we need to public documents.

South Dakota has arguably the weakest open-records law in the nation. Unlike 49 other states and the federal government, there is neither a presumption of openness here nor is there a way to quickly and efficiently resolve disputes over public records.

Offered by Sen. Nancy Turbak Berry, a Democrat from Watertown, SB189 starts with a presumption that public records should be open to the public unless there is a logical and legitimate reason that they should not be. It begins with this simple sentence: "Except as otherwise specifically provided by law, every record of a public entity is a public record, open and accessible for inspection during reasonable office hours."

The bill goes on to list comprehensive but specific categories of records that, for personal, proprietary and public-safety reasons, would not be open to the public. And it includes injunction safeguards for public agencies that question the release of any disputed documents.

SB189 has significant bipartisan support, including the co-sponsorship of two Rapid City Republican legislators: Rep. Ed McLaughlin and Rep. David Lust. It has our support, too, and McLaughlin and Lust have our thanks for theirs.

"I think we need to operate with an open government, and I think we need to address the issue in some way this year," McLaughlin said, offering his support for either of the bills.

But we can't support SB186 in its current form, which takes one step forward on open records but two steps backwards on open meetings. It has numerous provisions that would contract, not expand, the public's right to know what its government is doing.

Gov. Mike Rounds and too many legislators take a paternalistic approach to the public when it comes to public records. Their ingrained attitude that the records belong more to the agency that created it than the taxpayers who fund it is as outdated as filing cabinets in an age of electronic data banks.

They seem to think this is of interest only to the media, but they are wrong about that. South Dakota is filled with citizen- activists who take their rights to open government very seriously, not to mention the genealogists, historians, librarians, researchers and others who rely on public documents to do their jobs.

Others, including McLaughlin and Lust, are attempting to make our state government better by pursuing a presumption of openness in public records. Please help them do that by urging your senators and representatives to support SB189 and not SB186.