When the Boston University-sponsored New England Center for Investigative Reporting came poking around at the Massachusetts Division of Banks recently, what it found was a big fat question mark.

The intrepid reporters were looking into what the division did when faced with consumer complaints or regulatory red marks against mortgage originators. But the DOB has a zipped lip. Almost all of the complaints it gets are kept secret from the public.

On its face, the regulator’s stance seems reasonable. For the most part, what is considered to be a “complaint” – by consumers or by the state – is often technical in nature; failing to file notice of a bond in a timely fashion, for instance.

What the division doesn’t want is for mortgage originators to get unduly tarred and feathered in public, and for the public to lose confidence in the financial system. For that reason, it chooses to keep such violations hidden from public view. There is no reason, the regulator might assert, to levy blame and shame where it is not warranted, and where broad dissemination might do the originator undeserved harm.

As the newspaper of record for the banking and mortgage industries in Massachusetts, we’re enchanted by the concern. But as defenders of a system that should work for everyone, we’re not convinced – especially with proof evident that no such protectionism is needed.

New England’s second largest state, Connecticut, has no such qualms about restricting public access to such complaints. Nutmeg State Banking Commissioner Howard Pitkin points out that all such complaints and actions are readily available on the department’s Web site.

And yet the mortgage lending community in that state hasn’t fallen before the wrath of the rabble.

Making all complaints and regulatory actions public enhances public trust in the system, it doesn’t undermine it. And it also helps those mortgage lenders who do everything on the up-and-up. Moreover, knowing that even technical “slip ups” will wind up on Google searches is a pretty big incentive for a mortgage licensee to make sure everything is done by the book. That would certainly be better for the public. It would be better for the mortgage industry. And it would be better for the Division of Banks, because instead of hiding this all in the shadows, it could hold its head up proudly in the sunlight of open government.