Last week this newspaper, quoting Chicago Public Schools officials, reported that CPS CEO Arne Duncan, in the wake of the California shooting death of 15-year-old gay student Lawrence King, had sent out a memo reminding CPS personnel of the system’s non-discrimination policy and their obligation to address incidents of bias toward GLBT students.

Before reporting that, we asked CPS officials when exactly the memo went out, but we never got a reply to that question prior to going to press. After we went to press, someone from CPS called to tell us that the memo had been written but was still awaiting approval.

One, that was more than two and a half weeks after the King shooting and, two, telling us the memo went out and telling us it was still awaiting approval are two very different things.

Right now people in this country are fed up with government—at every level.

We’re fed up with a federal government that lied in order to push us into a costly and ill-conceived war halfway around the world. We’re fed up with watching lawmakers in Washington gorge on lobbyists’ dollars while refusing to deal with real issues such as healthcare, job loss, income stagnation and, in our community, employment equality and family rights.

Here in Illinois we’re fed up with dysfunctional, paranoid state officials who spend more time trying to outmaneuver their perceived enemies than they spend looking for solutions to Illinois’ very real—and mounting—problems.

Even more local, we’re fed up with a county government that’s blithely made our sales tax—the most regressive form of taxation possible—the highest in the nation, essentially to make sure that cronies and family members continue to collect salaries most of us can only dream of while performing very little work of actual value to the taxpayers who are getting gouged every time they make a purchase in Cook County.

People are so fed up that they’re willing to vote for any candidate who can say the word, “Change.”

And that’s no surprise—not when people asking questions about real problems that have real consequences in the lives of our children get stonewalled by public officials more bent on defending the system than responding openly and honestly to genuine concerns.

As we’ve been pointing out for several weeks now, GLBT kids in Chicago Public Schools need to know that their schools are safe, that their teachers and administrators understand why anti-gay discrimination and anti-gay bullying are wrong and that they are committed to stopping it in the classrooms and hallrooms of our schools.

That’s a pretty straightforward concern and it deserves a straightforward response. We’re still waiting for that response from CPS.

In a related issue that also involves our GLBT youths, there was a meeting March 7 about youth issues on Halsted Street that involved aldermen and officials from various City agencies and service providers. There’s no report about it in this newspaper because the public and the press weren’t invited.

Do we have to spell out that this is an issue of public concern, not something to be worked out behind closed doors by a handful of people with the right connections?

What is there about this issue that the public shouldn’t know? Why isn’t the public entitled to be part of the solution? Why shouldn’t the people who foot the bills for all these services be allowed to know what’s being proposed before the details are worked out, not after the deals have been made?

Yes, there’s a need for change in this country, and apparently not just in Washington. Government is supposed to work for the people. It’s in the best interests of everyone involved for government to be open, honest and completely transparent. Any politician or government official who doesn’t believe that should find another line of work. And our community should keep in mind its responsibility to deliver that message to anyone who doesn’t get it.