For companies in the private sector, public relations is an accepted and essential function. A business may have a public relations representative or, if large enough, an entire department. A firm may also have outside public relations counsel. Customers don’t question that — it’s part of doing business.And yet, in municipal agencies, public relations is often considered suspect. News media have been known to criticize initiatives to communicate about major projects — school building referendums, infrastructure rehabilitation programs, wastewater treatment plant construction — as exercises in propaganda or image polishing. It’s unfair, and yet it keeps some public entities from
