Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge released an audit of border security operations to the American people today. The report noted insufficient border patrols in rural areas of upstate New York, Montana and New Mexico; it also questioned the sufficiency of freight inspections at the ports of Baltimore and New Orleans."We'll be asking Congress for an appropriation to address these areas as rapidly as possible," Ridge said.
Of course, we won't see a story of that sort in the newspapers; telling the citizens of the USA about weaknesses in border security is akin to telling it to those who would take advantage of the openings.
Similarly, that has been the underlying principle for not releasing the American Mensa Risk Audit to the membership. Like most of the rest of you, I haven't seen the audit and do not know its contents, so I can't fully explain why it should or should not be released. But I can explain why such matters must normally be kept on a need-to-know basis.
There are some reports that, if released publicly, will cause harm. Strategy on lawsuits (current and potential) and contract negotiations are among them. So are security reports — and risk analysis is, by its nature, a security report. Realistically, release of sensitive reports to the membership is the equivalent of releasing the report to the public; no "members only" label will provide adequate security for a report if 50,000 people have access and can forward it at will. In the case of a risk audit, there's even more reason to restrict its circulation — the risks addressed include the risk that one disgruntled member will do harm to the society sufficient to steal the advantages of the society away from all the others.
Should all or part of the risk audit be released to the membership? I truly don't know — but I believe that we need to trust AMC on this matter. The 21 members of AMC are American Mensans, chosen, directly or indirectly, by the membership of American Mensa to represent us. They are a diverse group of people, who have trouble agreeing on what time (or even whether) to break for lunch, and apparent unanimity that the audit shouldn't be released almost certainly means that it shouldn't be released. (No, I wouldn't expect a dissenting AMC member to leak the audit! But I would expect to hear public comments or even see a motion on the AMC agenda regarding release of the audit if serious disagreement existed about whether it should be released.)
Yes, I'd like to read the audit report myself. I'm sorry it didn't reach completion while I served on AMC (but complaints about the slow pace of the risk management process are a whole different matter!). But I'm willing to trust AMC to decide whether to release the audit — sometimes, such trust is necessary.