We couldn’t have written a better script for a farce than the shadow hiding the state of Oregon’s public records and meetings manual.

The manual explains Oregon’s laws about government openness. Unless Oregonians pay up, though, access is closed.

Oregon’s laws are freely available on the Internet. The bills the Legislature debates are freely available. Oregon Supreme Court decisions are up for free. Even the Oregon Blue Book, a very detailed annual Oregon almanac and factbook put out by the Secretary of State, is online and free. But the attorney general’s explanation for the public about how to get access to public meetings and public documents is not.

Bill Harbaugh, an economics professor at the University of Oregon, ignited the issue. He took a copy of the manual and put it online so anyone could see it, rather than pay the $25 the state charges. As of Tuesday afternoon, the manual was up, available through http://openuporegon.blogspot.com.

The Oregon Attorney General’s Office told Harbaugh not to redistribute his copy in any way. It says it owns the copyright.

That’s interesting: It owns the explanation of the law? In our thinking, if the state owns it, that means the public owns it.

Tony Green, the attorney general’s spokesman, explained. He told The Oregonian the manual is something that “only a truly elite group of people want,” and it’s not easy to use. We’re not even going to ask why it was written that way.

Regardless, we didn’t think much of the answer and asked for more information. Green said in an e-mail that it costs the Department of Justice $61,000 every two years to update and publish the manual. The printing costs are about $11,000, he said. The staff time is $50,000. The $25 the department charges is to recoup those costs. Justice doesn’t get money from the Legislature to produce it.

Green said the next version will be put online. A decision has not been made if there will be a charge to look at it.

The attorney general’s publication is like a user manual for the law. Oregonians are better served by having it freely available to the public online. Attorney General John Kroger has launched a top-to-bottom review of Oregon’s public records law. Putting the manual online for free is a good place to start.