Legum’s New Line

Check out my opening statement at the October 2 candidate forum in Cape St. Claire:

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I’ve written previously about Del. Heather Mizeur’s open government bill that, among other things, would require committee votes to be posted online, create a real time tracking system for floor votes and allow people to sign up online to testify before a committee.

Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who thought it was a good idea. Mizeur’s bill attracted a majority of lawmakers in both chambers as co-sponsors, seemingly putting it on the fast-track for passage.

But yet, the Washington Post reported this morning that Mizeur’s bill is not expected pass this year. Why?

Some of those close to the committee say codifying anything about putting hearings online, for example, could be a bad idea because technology may change. Chairmen of some powerful committees have also told the Rules Committee they are concerned about a provision letting members of the public sign up online to testify on legislation because they fear it could lead to too many people attending hearings.

In other words, some powerful members are concerned that if we make government more transparent more people will participate. This is exactly why we need this bill. The more people who participate in government, the better government works. When fewer people participate government ends up being controlled by insiders and special interests.

Unfortunately, there are still people committed to keeping citizens on the sidelines. I’m running to help change that.

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My friend Delegate Heather Mizeur has just introduced a great piece of legislation designed to increase transparency at the State House. The Washington Post has the details:

In addition to posting committee votes online, Mizeur wants the state’s real-time system for tracking floor votes in the House and Senate opened to the public via the Internet.

Mizeur also says that given the state’s condensed, 90-day legislative calendar, the public should be able to know about upcoming committee actions at least one day in advance and should be able to sign up online to testify in favor or against a bill, and then watch the proceedings online.

Thirdly, Mizeur says the public needs more useful and timely information about the Board of Public Works, an obscure three-member panel with vast powers.

“The public should have access to what lawmakers and government are doing,” Mizeur said. “It’s the State House, the people’s house.”

Mizeur is also proposing that the state open up its existing online legislative tracking system that provides up-to-the-minute info on votes. It is currently only available for a yearly fee of $800, which effectively excludes everyone except lobbyists and news organizations.

Mizeur’s bill would be an important step forward to creating a more open and accountable state government.

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I have been actively using a range of social media, including this blog, Twitter and Facebook, since I began my campaign. Recently, a columnist for our local paper, The Capital, interviewed me on the subject.

Naturally, we conducted the interview entirely over Twitter. Here’s an excerpt:

In that vein, I decided to conduct an interview entirely on Twitter with Legum, an Annapolis attorney who is a prolific Twitterer and blogger in addition to being a candidate. It was a challenge, given Twitter’s 140-character limit, which discourages even punctuation.

Legum, a 30-year-old Democrat, wrote: “Twitter has some advantages over other online tools like email because its transparent. I can see my neighbors q and your a.”

Indeed, the entire Twitter conversation between @ethartley and @juddlegum is in the open. So in case you really want to see the sausage made, I put the links on my blog.

We shouldn’t get carried away with the importance of any one method of communication. There’s a certain gee-whiz tone to some media coverage: “Ooh, Sarah Palin’s on Twitter!” Over time, though, that novelty will fade as it has for the Web in general.

Twitter itself or any one site isn’t that important. But the trend of openness is. In effect, much of the information held by governments has historically been closed to the public, since you had to drive to a state capital or Washington, D.C., to get it. It was legally public, but few actually saw it, leading to the term “practical obscurity.”

Now people expect everything to be online, and that’s truer the younger they are. Legum agreed this should keep politicians more honest.

“I think so + more info should be online,” he wrote. “To start, stream and archive all public committee meetings (legislative and exec.).”

Legum said he’ll continue “tweeting” if elected and will put his official schedule online so people know what he’s doing all the time.

You can read the full column here.

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There are a lot of people who dismiss political blogs as the ramblings of people with an inflated sense of self importance. Occasionally that’s true, but oftentimes blogs can play a useful role in making government work better.

Recently, Maryland Politics Watch published a post noting that many members of the Maryland Legislature received “non-revenue” E-Z Passes that allowed them to go through toll booths for free. It was an uncomfortable revelation since the Maryland Transportation Department just imposed additional monthly fees on everyone else.

A few days ago, according to a document obtained by Maryland Politics Watch, the legislature announced they were ending the free E-Z Pass program.

I think this was the right call amid a national economic downturn and a persistent state budget deficit. But it also might not have happened had the free E-Z pass program not been publicized by a blog. It’s a small but important example of how new media can make government work a bit better.

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Here’s a short speech I gave to Netroots Nation, a convention of online activists, in Pittsburgh last week:

You can check out some of the other speakers that night, including President Bill Clinton, on C-Span.

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Anne Arundel County Executive John Leopold is accused of sexually harassing two women. This morning on NPR, the chair of the Anne Arundel County Council, Ed Reilly (R) said that this was a “personal” matter:

John Leopold has done an excellent job of being fiscal manager for this county. The issues he has in his personal life are personal.

One of the allegations involves the alleged harassment of a state employee in a county building. The other involves a former county employee who worked for Leopold.

It’s absurd to suggest that whether or not the County Executive sexually harasses women at the workplace is a “personal” matter. The allegations go directly to Leopold’s fitness as a public official and are rightly of public concern.

The allegations should be fully and swiftly investigated and, if proven true, Leopold should resign or be removed from office.

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Public financing legislation supported by the unlikely coalition of Common Cause, Progressive Maryland and Senate President Mike Miller will likely fail. The Baltimore Sun has the details:

A proposal for public financing of General Assembly campaigns appears dead this year after a fiery debate in the Maryland Senate over the idea of using taxpayer dollars for political activities.

Senators made several changes to the bill, argued over its necessity and complained that the full implications were unclear before voting, 27-20, Wednesday to send the bill back to committee. The procedural move means that further work on the bill is unlikely this legislative session, which ends in less than three weeks.

“I think it’s done for the year,” Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller said after the vote. “The general sentiment was, we should be focusing on the budget, and this would be perceived as assisting ourselves in campaigning and electioneering as contrasted to working for the public good.”

In general, the failure underscores the difficulty of enacting campaign financing reform. Such reform must be approved by the very people who have found success under the current campaign financing system. These reforms, particularly public financing, may open up the system to more people and threaten their positions of power.

Specifically, the legislation failed after “the Senate passed an amendment that closed a loophole that would have allowed individuals to avoid campaign finance limits by giving through multiple limited-liability companies.” Apparently, some incumbent senators didn’t want to see it closed.

The good news is that this legislation advanced farther than it ever had in the past. Hopefully, Maryland will soon be ready pass genuine campaign finance reform.

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Plans to award executives at AIG huge bonuses has created a national uproar over the last few days. Meanwhile, as Marylanders struggle to pay their utility bills, Constellation Energy Group — the parent company of BGE — created a plan to award top executives millions in “performance and retention incentives” over the next two years.

The Baltimore Sun has the details:

Constellation Energy Group, which narrowly avoided bankruptcy last year, negotiated a deal with France’s largest utility ensuring senior managers would receive up to $32 million in long-term performance and retention incentives during the next two years.

The move comes as the Baltimore company, which agreed to sell half of its nuclear power business to Electricite de France for $4.5 billion, has laid off hundreds of workers, slashed its stockholder dividend and is seeking rate increases for its BGE customers.

…”I can’t tell you the number of people who have called me, having trouble with their utility bills,” said state Sen. George Della Jr., a Baltimore Democrat. “It’s sad to think that we had a great utility here in the state of Maryland, and to reward someone for bringing the company to the brink of bankruptcy and then giving them a … bonus, that’s beyond reason to me.”

In February, BGE announced that would “request an increase in the rate it charges for the delivery of electricity and natural gas.” Gov. O’Malley is proposing a partial re-regulation of the electricity industry in Maryland.

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This afternoon, Common Cause, Progressive Maryland and Senate President Mike Miller announced a public financing compromise. The New Line just spoke with Maryland Common Cause Executive Director Ryan O’Donnell and got the details. First, how candidates qualify for public funds:

– Candidates who seek to qualify for public funds are permitted to raise up to $3500 outside of the public financing system to get them started

– Next, a candidate will have to raise 350 qualifying contributions of $5 or more from individuals. This money will not go to their campaign. It will go to the public campaign fund.

– Finally, the candidate also has to raise another $1000 for the public campaign fund.

– After you raise the 350 small contribution plus the additional $1000, you qualify.

Next, how much money qualified candidates get:

– If you have a contested primary and general election you will receive $100,000 as a State Senate candidate and $80,000 as a House of Delegates candidate.

– You can elect to receive up to 70% of money in the primary. (Useful if your primary has more competition than your general.)

– Money will be doled out on a first come, first served basis.

– If your opponent spends 150% of what you are given in public money, you will receive 50% more. That means publicly financed candidates could receive up to $150,000.

Finally, how the program is funded:

– Marylanders will check a box that diverts $5 of their existing tax liability into the public campaign fund. Common cause estimates this will raise about $1 million per year.

– The first year, the public campaign fund will get an influx of $5 million from a gubernatorial public financing fund that is no longer used.

Importantly, O’Donnell indicated that he considers this a “pilot program.” There isn’t enough money dedicated to fully fund the program moving forward. The idea is to show that it can work and push to expand it. O’Donnell hopes that in the first year, a handful of incumbents will show you can run and win with public money. Fully funding the program, he estimated, would cost about $30 million each year.

Further, O’Donnell acknowledges that the funding provided could put you at a substantial financial disadvantage in some districts, where fundraising can exceed $200,000 for legislative races. Mike Miller, for example, already has $644,000 for the 2010 election. The bill also substantially increases individual and aggregate donation limits for contributors to candidates who do not opt into the public campaign system.

While the proposal is not perfect, it seems a step in the right direction for Maryland. If the proposal becomes law, Maryland will become one of a handful of states with a legitimate public financing option for candidates to consider.

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