BEST GOVERNMENT MOUTHPIECE

Henry Haupt, spokesman for Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White

Henry Haupt is the best in the business for several reasons. He returns phone calls pronto. He’s been known to answer calls from reporters even when he’s sick or on vacation. But the best thing Haupt does is get out of the way. Most folks think of the secretary of state’s office as the place to get a driver’s license, but the office does a ton of other stuff, from regulating the securities industry to keeping track of corporate records to watching over the Capitol campus – the agency even has its own police force. No one person could possibly know the answer to everything, and Haupt doesn’t pretend he has more brain cells than anyone else. Rather than relaying information to reporters from bureaucrats or demanding questions in writing, which makes follow-up questions tough and invites inaccuracies, Haupt tracks the bureaucrats down and gets them on the phone with journalists, and he does it quickly. Actually having a conversation with folks who have firsthand knowledge has grown rare in government, but Haupt has kept common sense alive on the Capitol campus. He doesn’t get quoted much, and when you think about it, that’s a good thing.