To:
Karl S. Aro, executive director of the Department of Legislative Services; Thomas V. Mike Miller, president of the Senate; Michael E. Busch, Speaker of the House of Delegates; Governor Martin O’Malley
From:
Marjie Slater-Kaplan, LWVMD Action Chair
The League of Women Voters of Maryland is a willing and active participant with our State Legislature every year. We participate in the committee process as well as exercising our advocacy skills on many, many topics.
Over the years MLIS has been wonderfully helpful by providing print copies of bills and fiscal reports, and more recently with your enhanced web capabilities and the fabulous access to information through that venue. We also appreciate the candid and frank analysis your staff performs on their fiscal notes for each bill.
However, there are still several items we would hope that you will consider in providing effective access of state legislative information to the public
1. Committee votes are not available anywhere on the website. They are available only if you call a member of the committee staff. And complicating things further, these votes are not usually taken at or just after the committee’s hearing on the bill(s) or topic. Most of us have to guess when the votes have been taken and flounder with phone calls to find out this information. We would like to see a more open process, but until that happens these votes should be published on the MLIS website, either on the bill page or on the committee page.
2. Free access to Up-To-The-Minute. In some areas immediate access to the actions of the legislature is very helpful to citizens to help us analyze competing legislation and other matters before our elected officials in Annapolis. We have a spread-out and diverse state and the League of Women Voters encourages our members and citizens at large to become familiar and involved with what’s going on in Annapolis. If technology is available then we feel it should be available to all of us, at no charge. Access to our government should not be on a fee for service basis.
3. Broadcast of the Board of Public Works. Public Works is another of our bodies which has a great impact on the people of Maryland and finalizes the spending of many hundreds of millions of dollars, often bi-weekly. Often issues of public policy and concern are raised at this public meeting that are not able to be voiced appropriately in other places. We feel it would not only be instructive to our citizens but of great interest to many. There are many times when it is impossible to gain access to these meetings because of the large numbers of people who attend.
