Gov. Crist Steps up on open government

The big June news for Florida editors is Gov. Crist’s announcement of a Commission on Open Government. The nine-member commission is loaded with long-time friends of openness, such as Bob Butterworth and Sandy D’Alemberte, and chaired by Barbara Petersen of the First Amendment Foundation. FSNE President Jeanne Grinstead is a prominent member.

The commission’s mission is to review and recommend changes to Florida’s Sunshine Laws, which determine public access to government meetings and records. One expected target will be the several hundred piecemeal exemptions the legislature has granted since enactment of the Sunshine Laws. The Governor made clear at his press conference announcing the commission that there will be no restrictions on where members can look, meaning the legislature’s own rules that allow secret deliberations on such vital matters as tax law changes could be a reform target. The commission has a Dec. 31, 2008 deadline for completing work and recommending changes.

It is imperative Florida newspapers turn out for the four public hearings scheduled around the state: August 22-23 in Tallahassee; Oct. 16-17 in Orlando; Feb. 12-13 and May 20-21 at sites to be named in southeast and southwest Florida. Petersen says it is important that journalists and citizens bring with them specific examples of barriers to access, such as exorbitant copying fees and unduly complicated processes. Start collecting those anecdotes now and plan to attend or send a representative to one or more of the public hearings.

Among the issues to be considered by the commission are the following: “The relevance and redundancy of all exemptions to government meetings and records. Fees and charges imposed for inspecting and copying public records in light of advances in information technology. Collection, storage, retrieval, dissemination and accessibility of public records through advanced technologies, including Internet access. Current policies regarding the public’s right to participate in agency meetings subject to the Sunshine Law, including, but not limited to, the right to speak at meetings and whether such meetings conducted through the use of telephone, video conference or other remote electronic means is consistent with rights guaranteed by the Florida Constitution.”

Silliness about newspapers and the lobbying laws

A real money loser for Florida newspapers is delivering and selling papers  in Tallahassee.  The  metros  did  this routinely for  years as support for their capitol bureaus and as a public service.  The rationale was to show local delegations that their papers were paying attention to the legislators’ activities;  the  editorial  pages  also had  their  voices  strengthened  by  same-day  presence  at  capitol  breakfast  tables.

The harsh, economic challenge facing papers has led to significant cutbacks in Tallahassee service is the past three years. With the exceptions of the St. Petersburg Times and Florida Times-Union, state papers have either eliminated distribution in Tallahassee or limited it to the 60-day legislative session.

So now come Senate and House leaders crimping that distribution even further by prohibiting the delivery of free papers to legislators. Lucy Morgan, the Times senior capitol correspondent,  lays the sorry story out in Friday’s paper.

The leaders allowed courtesy (free) deliveries in the 2006 legislative session. Their tortured logic now is that although most papers don’t directly hire lobbyists they do belong to trade organizations (Florida Press Association, FSNE) that do employ lobbyists. The new lobbying laws prohibit lawmakers “from accepting anything of value, even a cup of coffee, from lobbyists and the businesses that hire them,” Morgan writes.  (Full disclosure: I am a registered lobbyist for FSNE for safety’s sake alone. I do not routinely lobby but represent editors’ interests concerning open meetings and open records laws.)

The real reason for this crackdown on freebie papers appears to have  more to do with bruised,  political feelings than good government. The Senate’s general counsel launched his investigation of the Times’ free deliveries the same day the paper wrote an editorial critical of the legislature’s implementation of the new lobbying law.

Particularly troubling about all this is the legislature’s implicit identification of papers as special interests.  This parallels the cultural migration of newspapers’ image from one of  disinterested community servant  to profit-driven sensationalist.  Florida papers, which are among the nation’s best and most responsible,  deserve better from the legislature.

Funny How Things Happen in the Florida Legislature

It was instructive hanging with FPA and FSNE lobbyist Curt Kiser this week. I learned about serendipity in the legislative process.

Sen. Victor Crist (R-Tampa) is the lead Senate sponsor of a bill that would prohibit disclosure of all personal information in public records, such as name, address, phone number, etc. When Curt and I visited Crist, he was surprised to learn how far reaching the exemption would be. In effect, it would eviscerate the Sunshine requirements for maintenance and inspection of public records.

Crist explained that he introduced his bill as a companion to HB1213 as a favor to House Speaker Rubio. Crist understood it to be related to the privacy concerns of an animal shelter in St. Augustine. The shelter, it seems, received a complaint from a local resident who had acquired an animal at the shelter. The former owner of the animal had used the shelter’s public records to contact the new owner and demand return of the animal. The new owner was understandably upset and took it out on the public record requirement.

Curt dug into a second privacy concern, this time in South Florida, that was also tied to the introduction of the two bills. Curt learned that the Broward Symphony was worried it might have to make its donor list available because it had received a state grant. Curt questions whether the grant makes the orchestra subject to Sunshine disclosures in the first place.

The bills amount to a cannon employed to shoot a gnat. If exemption is justified in either case, a dubious proposition at best, the language should be as narrowly drawn as possible.

Sen. Crist, after hearing our concerns, reiterated his support for the Sunshine Laws and promised to look closely and critically at the bill he had introduced as a favor to a powerful political ally.

The privacy concerns at work here are wonderfully and fully explored in an invaluable history of Florida’s Sunshine laws. The writer is Pete Weitzel, retired Miami Herald managing editor and the moving force behind The First Amendment Foundation. It’s called “The White Paper,” A Narrative History of Open Government in Florida. It’s available from the First Amendment Foundation. More information can be found on the FAF web site.

Crist’s Love-In With Sunshine Week

The First Amendment Foundation’s Sunshine Recognition Luncheon this week in Tallahassee provided Gov. Charlie Crist another opportunity to make clear his administration is really, really different from his predecessor’s on Sunshine issues. “I’m really passionate about it,” Crist told his appreciative audience of journalists and ranking government officials. MC Mike Vasalinda, introducing Crist, referred diplomatically to the Bush years as “somewhat of a black hole” on access and records issues.

Crist issued a proclamation hailing Sunshine Week and restating his commitment on open government and public records issues. Lt. Gov. Kottkamp, a longtime Sunshine supporter, said that he and the governor believe “that open government is the best way we can respect the public trust that is bestowed upon all of us who serve the people.”

Atty. Gen. Bill McCollum used the occasion to signal his support also. He announced a grant to the Brechner Center to study how new technology can make public records more accessible.

The voices off all three, plus Crist’s veto pen, could be influential in persuading legislators to be very careful about drilling more exemptions in the Sunshine laws.

Preview of 2007 Florida legislative Sunshine issues

The 2007 legislative session will again be busy with Sunshine issues, based on what I heard this week in Tallahassee.

Adrian Harper, director of the First Amendment Foundation, says an early bill count shows the filing of about as many proposed exemptions to the Florida open records/meetings law as past sessions. That’s a bit of a surprise because the executive (Gov. Crist in particular) and legislative leadership are far friendlier, at least so far and publicly, on First Amendment issues than their predecessors.

House Speaker Rubio (100 Ideas for Florida) appears to be the spiritual father of a half dozen bills in the House and Senate that would severely limit the release of “personal identification information” in public documents when so requested by the person. That information would include name, address, telephone number, etc. Even innocent possession of such information, say by a reporter or researcher, would be a felony. The intent of the bills appears to be to curb credit agency access to government records and cut down identity theft. The bills’ result would be evisceration of the disclosable content of many public records.

The atmosphere in Tallahassee with the “bipartisan” Crist is very different than with Bush, who rarely if ever lifted a finger to help on Sunshine issues. Crist has created an Open Government office and relies heavily on the counsel of our First Amendent friend Pat Gleason. Crist is expected to cede power back to the legislature, which in turn is expected to proceed in an orderly, accountable fashion on Sunshine issues, thus avoiding late-session blindsidings.
An emerging issue to watch is how Sunshine law requirements might be narrowed for new, quasi-governmental entities like the Scripps Institute, Moffitt Cancer Center and Byrd Alzheimer’s Center. Also teed up is a bill that would allow hospitals to conduct key job searches in secret.

 

 

 

 

 

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