How This Site Works
Open Bedford republishes official public records of Bedford County government so residents can find and understand them. This page describes how that actually works — where the facts come from, what software does, what people do, and what this site does not publish.
Version 1.0 · Effective August 5, 2026
Where the Facts Come From
Every figure and statement on this site links to the official document it came from — county, state, or federal. When a document is retrieved, the original is archived in write-once storage with the date and source recorded, so readers can check a fact against the source even if the government later moves, revises, or removes the page it came from. Where this site's presentation and the official record differ, the official record controls.
What Is Automated, and What Is Not
Software watches county web pages, detects changes, and files copies of new documents. That is the machines' whole job: finding and copying. Anything that involves judgment — summarizing a document, recording a vote, explaining an issue — is reviewed by a person before it appears on the site, checked against the source document it describes. AI-assisted content is labeled, and an AI summary that misstates its source is treated as this site's error and corrected.
What This Site Does Not Publish
No Endorsements or Ratings
This site does not endorse or oppose any candidate, official, party, or ballot measure, and does not publish ratings, rankings, or scorecards of anyone's performance or character.
No Claims About Motive
The site reports what officials did as the record states it — how they voted, what was approved, what was spent. It does not speculate about why. Readers draw their own conclusions.
No Personal Information Beyond the Record
Content is screened before publication for personal identifying information such as account numbers, birth dates, and home addresses. Where a redaction is made, it is visibly marked.
No Anonymous Sourcing
This site has no sources; it has documents. Nothing is published on the basis of an unnamed person's account. Tips received through the site are treated as leads to public records, not as publishable claims.
When Something Is Missing
The county does not publish everything, and this site does not fill gaps with guesses. Where a meeting time, a dollar figure, or a document is not in the official record, the site says "not posted" rather than inferring a value. An absence on this site means an absence in the record — never an assumption.
Corrections
Errors are corrected visibly and on the record, with a dated note describing what changed. The full process — what counts as an error, how to report one, and what happens next — is described in the Corrections Policy, and corrections are logged publicly.
Public Records Requests
Some documents on this site are obtained through requests under the Tennessee Public Records Act. Requests are filed by Open Bedford's founder as a Tennessee citizen, are listed in a public request log on a uniform schedule that applies identically to every request, and responses are published as received — including any redactions the government applied.
Independence
This site is operated by Open Bedford LLC, a Tennessee limited liability company, and is not affiliated with any government agency. Open Bedford does not endorse candidates, accept political donations, or affiliate with any PAC or political organization. As a standing practice, the site does not launch new features about individual officials in the period immediately before an election — coverage follows the calendar of county government, not the calendar of campaigns.