Estes Park Trail Gazette: The Town of Estes Park’s decision earlier this week to move forward with a program that will allow the public to access town board e-mails online is a great example of transparency.

We roundly applaud that move.

It shows that our elected officials understand their role in the community and the need for the public to get a better handle on how they are informed and just what they are thinking.

Elected officials in Fort Collins and Loveland are already doing this. Larimer County allows public access to incoming e-mails only.

For the record, these e-mails are public record and currently are available to the public with a Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) request through the town clerk’s office.

This step just eliminates the CORA request and frees up the town clerk’s office to work on other things.

This program actually began late last fall when Mayor Todd Jirsa agreed to test it as a pilot program. It seemed to run well and was reliable enough for the board to consider it for all trustees.

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