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That’s the sense I got from talking to Rebecca Varney this week.

She should have been happy. At least that was my expectation. Earlier this month, Phelps County Circuit Judge John Beger ruled in her favor. Edgar Springs was wrong to kick her out of City Hall. The city was wrong to deny her public documents.

The city would have to pay for its violations of the law and her constitutional rights. Beger had already ruled in Varney’s favor on some of the issues she raised in 2019. But city officials kept fighting and forced her to take them to trial earlier this year. She won a complete victory.

Regular readers will remember that I’ve written about Varney’s plight since 2019. She was pulled over for allegedly not stopping long enough at a stop sign. If you’ve been to Edgar Springs, located in the middle of Missouri along Highway 63, you know it’s a notorious speed trap that generates much of its revenue from traffic tickets. When the Missouri Legislature was cracking down on that practice, Edgar Springs was one of the cities that unsuccessfully tried to stop the legislation.

After her ticket, Varney, who lives with her sister, started paying attention to things at City Hall. She asked for records. She attended meetings. She encouraged a state audit.

City Hall fought back. The city attorney, Brandi Baird, banned Varney from City Hall. Her Sunshine Law requests were denied. Those actions, Beger determined in his ruling, were an attempt to “intimidate and silence� Varney. He fined the city $150 and ordered it to pay $43,995 in attorney fees.

It was a win for citizens. It was a win for Varney and her attorney, David Roland of the nonprofit . But it was a win that came at a personal cost.

“It’s been difficult,� Varney told me.

Edgar Springs is a town of about 200. Everybody knows everybody. It takes courage to criticize local elected officials. You’ll see everybody when dropping your granddaughter off at school or at the grocery store. And you’ll realize you’re the only person not allowed in City Hall.

That’s why Beger’s decision was so important.

He wrote in the ruling: “The actions of the defendants in this case, apparently seeking to intimidate and silence Varney from exercising her rights to examine and be knowledgeable about the workings of her city government, are disturbing, especially when considered in the context of the free and open democratic society in which we are purported to live.�

It’s not supposed to be that difficult to keep an eye on the inner-workings of government. But in too many places, whether it’s a big city like St. Louis or a tiny town in Phelps County, government officials too often respond to people like Varney by making it harder for them to attend meetings or obtain documents. And when called on their failures, those officials dig in rather than apologize and move on.

Baird, the attorney who blocked Varney from City Hall, is a former judge who once tried to keep me out of a court hearing so I couldn’t see her send poor people to jail because they couldn’t afford fines and fees issued in Dent County.

Roland, the Freedom Center attorney, gave Baird, the city’s mayor and the police chief opportunities to remove Varney’s “no trespassing� order, provide her the records she sought and make the dispute go away. The city stood firm.

Varney points to Roland, whose nonprofit represents clients for free, as the hero of the case. Without him, she might still be banned from City Hall, and the rest of the state wouldn’t know the level to which some cities will go to keep their citizens in the dark.

“The most important takeaway from this victory and others like it is that citizens can successfully fight City Hall and that those responsible for violating their citizens’ rights can be held accountable,� Roland wrote in an email. “No government entity is so big that it should be permitted to ignore its citizens’ rights — and this case also shows that no government is so small that it should avoid similar scrutiny. It should not take a thumping in court to persuade government entities to respect their citizens’ rights, but if a government entity needs such a thumping, I am glad to help provide it.�