The reason people devote themselves to public service is so they can serve the public.

In theory, anyway.

Mary Souza, a local government watchdog whose skeptical views and strong remarks have targeted numerous public servants - and newspaper editors, for that matter - emailed a public records request late last month to the head of Coeur d'Alene's urban renewal agency. Souza requested an updated, emailed spreadsheet showing current Lake City Development Corp. projects.

What she got wasn't what she sought. Souza and LCDC's Tony Berns exchanged polite emails that amounted to a standoff: Berns was telling Souza to submit a specific form, and Souza was telling Berns the request as she phrased and submitted it fully met Idaho code.

Some week and a half later, after involving LCDC's Boise-based attorney, Souza received a printout from LCDC, which contained the information she sought but not in the format she'd requested - and had been given in the past. Souza recounted the unsavory experience in her broadly distributed newsletter Sunday and The Press reported it Tuesday.

We believe LCDC has generally improved over the past couple years, primarily because it is focused more on projects aligned with its mission rather than backing pet projects of wealthy developers. But we wonder if perhaps LCDC still hasn't gotten an important message imparted by a consultant it hired several years ago: Be more open with and responsive to the public. That advice wasn't heeded in February 2010, and it wasn't exactly embraced in this latest case.

In February 2010, another watchdog, Dan Gookin, asked permission - as state law says he can - to examine LCDC's check register. Berns attempted to charge Gookin $58.10, the equivalent of one hour's pay for Berns back then, and Gookin refused to pay. In late March of that year, The Press paid the bill and posted the LCDC check registry on cdapress.com. That May, LCDC began posting its financial statements monthly on lcdc.org.

The Souza matter constitutes a step backward. Like the $58.10 fiasco, LCDC is paying for rotten publicity that can only intensify citizens' suspicions and skepticism. It's a lesson we hope is understood by other taxing entities dealing with public records requests.