Camera-shy lawmakers seek cover
In 2008, New Mexico taxpayers spent $30,000 to equip the Senate gallery with video equipment that would allow for floor sessions to be broadcast over the Internet.
But a week before the 2009 session started, Senate leadership decided it really didn't want that much transparency, and ordered that the cameras be removed. They worried that senators could be filmed in a less-than-flattering condition — such as catching a few winks in their chairs as Sen. Blowhard droned on late into the night. And, those clips could then be used against the sleepy lawmaker in future campaign ads.
Senators sometimes get tired and "say the wrong thing," Sen. Carlos Cisneros, D-Questa, told Santa Fe New Mexican reporters Kate Nash and Steve Terrell. "Once that's done, you're on YouTube and there's nothing you can do."
And thus started a battle that rages to this day between those who want to make the process more transparent and those who are more concerned about protecting themselves.
Former Rep. Janice Arnold-Jones, R-Albuquerque, who is now running for Congress in the First District, forced the issue that year when she brought a friend's camera and her own laptop computer to a meeting of the House Taxation and Revenue Committee and brought live streaming to the New Mexico Legislature for the first time — despite the protests of committee Chairman Ed Sandoval, D-Albuquerque.
House leadership convened a hasty meeting and decided it would be up to each committee chairman to decide when cameras would be allowed. But they had to have known the dye was cast and they were on the wrong side of the argument.
Now, you can go to the Legislature's website, www.nmlegis.gov/lcs, and click a link on the right-hand side to access webcasts — with the following disclaimer: "This stream of the New Mexico House of Representatives is being provided as a public service and is not an official record of the House of Representatives' proceedings. Any political use of this stream is prohibited."
Gov. Susana Martinez began taping selected sessions and committee meetings last year — primarily those dealing with controversial issues such as her attempts to rescind the bill that allows illegal aliens to obtain New Mexico driver's licenses.
This year Martinez has expanded that operation.
Albuquerque Journal reporter Dan Boyd wrote last week that the governor's office now has three people filming the Legislature. That has allowed them to cover both the House and Senate floor sessions, and the most important committee meetings.
If you go to the governor's website, www.governor.state.nm.us/, there is a link at the bottom titled "Webcasting the Legislature" where you can tune in to live events, or watch past sessions from a growing archive.
Senate leaders have grumbled that it's all political. Boyd reports that Majority Leader Michael Sanchez, D-Belen has even had his staffer shooting video of the Martinez staffers as they are shooting video of the session. How petty.
If the governor's office was selectively editing the videos and only posting those that are the most inflammatory, there would be a valid argument against her. But it's not. Her office is shooting as much as possible, given its three-person staff, and putting it all up online.
Gov. Martinez surely understands better than the senator from Belen how difficult it is for those of us in the far reaches of the state to stay on top of what is going on in Santa Fe. This allows us to see and hear, in real time, exactly what is being said and done by those elected to represent us. And, if some of that turns out to be things we're not real pleased with, and we take that into account at the voting booth this November, so be it.
Walter Rubel has been a newsman for more than 25 years and is managing editor of the Sun-News. He can be reached at wrubel@lcsun-news.com.
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