Review of An Evening with Jim Lehrer

 

My wife and I attended "An Evening with Jim Lehrer," the justly-famous newsman and Presidential debate moderator. He was funny, smart, and entertaining. Our review of the evening is at http://dcmetrotheaterarts.com/2016/03/25/jim-lehrer-writers-center/

 

Coming to the Key Time on Open Meetings Bills

We're coming to the most important time in this year's session of the Maryland General Assembly for all bills. This coming Monday is "crossover day," when bills that have not been passed in one house will have a much more difficult time to be passed in both houses.

The latest information is that the bills to increase training for members of Maryland public bodies have been amended in the House committee considering them, but we don't yet know if the amendments help or hurt the cause of open meetings.

So, if you believe as strongly as I do in the need for more action to make all public bodies in Maryland more concerned about opening their meetings, with limited exceptions, to public view, please contact your Delegates and Senators now.

The bill number is HB 823, sponsored by Delegate Marice Morales of Montgomery County.
 

Good Article on Open Meetings - Arguments Against More Training are Specious

Sunshine Week for Marylanders: Oh, that free Open Meetings Act training is so darned difficult!
By dadadata, on Daily Kos 
2016/03/15 · 12:41
You'd think the online training for the Open Meetings Act was like corralling a giant rock crusher on a rampage.
Would your local government rather you stay in the dark, like mushrooms do? 
If testimony in the General Assembly by Maryland Association of Counties and the Maryland Municipal League every year is the measure, the answer is “yes.”
Each time the idea of making local government and its board and commission members aware of the law concerning open meetings and how to conduct public business comes up in the General Assembly, they haul out the same set of excuses  - which your elected representatives in Annapolis parrot.
The two organizations are supported by local government memberships (your money), and the members are councilmembers and commissioners (your elected representatives). MACo and MML lobbyists aren't, technically, lobbyists because they've convinced the General Assembly to exempt these local government membership organizations. But in truth, they lobby for loopholes.
MACo-MML Top 10 Reasons
                                                         ... why members of boards and commissions should not have to take the free online Open Meetings Act training:
10. No internet at home.
Use the Public Library, paid for by public money.
9. Volunteers don't have the time.
There's no board in Maryland that consumes less than two hours a year, which is what the training should take.
8. Forced training means fewer volunteers.
    a --If volunteers don't want to learn how to properly conduct public business they shouldn't be appointed to any committee conducting public business.
    b --The more citizens that know how meetings are to be properly conducted, the better. The volunteers will return to being plain citizens. They might find the knowledge valuable.
    c --Ask your local zoning board how much annual training they must take. I've yet to see a zoning board short of members except when the council or commissioners are fooling around with appointments for reasons of their own.
7. Because
  6. Because
    5. Because
      4. Because
        3. Because
          2. Because
And the Number 1 reason, according to MACo written testimony:
1. “However, the inclusion of all officers will place a burden on all sizes of public bodies and will be especially challenging for small volunteer bodies that in many cases are already struggling to attract participants.”
Yes, the same 35-word comment is used in opposing four bills in this year’s session; the same paragraph, without any data to back up the “many” bodies “struggling” to find members, is recycled every year.
The “participants” are bound by the law whether they know it or not (and there are many who don’t). Something else probably causes the “struggle” for members.
It’s long past time for MML and MACo to step out of their box, stop claiming that knowing the law costs money and take the right stand on training in Maryland’s Open Meetings Act. If anything costs money, it’s public bodies responding to avoidable citizen complaints to the Open Meetings Compliance Board.
When the local government members of MML and MACo speak up and say, “Get out of the way of sensible legislation,” then the municipal lobbyists  will.
    There are a couple of bills to make more training mandatory in front of the General Assembly.
    Want to train yourself? It takes about 2 hours, and you can stop and go back later: www.igsr.umd.edu/… The website is maintained by the University of Maryland.

 

Sunshine Week

This week is "National Sunshine Week," which occurs each March to coincide with the birthday of James Madison and Freedom of Information Day. It is a time for discussions and programs on the subject that government functions best when it operates in the open.

Most Marylanders would probably think that our state is among the best for open meetings but the opposite is true. As mentioned in a Baltimore Sun op-ed today, "A 2015 report by the State Integrity Project ranks Maryland 41st out of 50 states, with a grade of "F" for access to public information. This is an embarrassment, and Marylanders deserve better."

There are still too many violations of the Open Meetings Act, including a recent one that I brought and won against the MoCo Board of Elections. Too many people, including members of the MoCo Board of  Education, said they consider this to be a matter of "technicalities."

The public has a right to watch just about all government meetings and to obtain just about all government documents. There are a few exceptions but in practice many government bodies act as if the rule should be secrecy rather than openness.

Several bills were introduced in the Maryland General Assembly this year to strengthen the Open Meetings Act, but they were opposed by those with influence in Annapolis. This is a sorry situation.