It may pale in comparison to D-Day, and they will certainly never make a movie about it, but today is the beginning of W-Week, the last chance we have to get open records reform legislation passed this year.
All year we have been told that a new open records law is the foundation of democratic government . . . the cornerstone of legislative reform . . . the clearest signal the legislature can send that its members got the message the people of Pennsylvania delivered at the polls in May and November 2006: they are tired of business as usual – that is to say, business done behind closed doors and out of public sight.
All year we have been told that a bill – a good bill – would soon be on the governor’s desk. In the spring we were told that a bill would be passed before summer. In the summer we were told that a bill would be ready right after Labor Day. In the fall we were told that a bill would become law before the end of the year.
Well, here it is the middle of December, and where do things stand? Who knows, but with the Senate set to adjourn on Wednesday – and with several members of the Black Caucus planning to leave the same day for the National Black Caucus of State Legislators in Arkansas – this session has effectively three days to go. That means that the legislature has three days to live up to a promise it made months ago. But the House seems in such a state of disarray that it may take more than three days to get a quorum, let alone pass a bill.
And it’s not like we don’t need transparency – for despite all the promises of reform, 2007 will be remembered as the year of PHEAA’s fall from grace – and of a little something called “bonus gate” that we will undoubtedly hear a lot more about in 2008.
So here’s hoping that this holiday season the legislature produces a gift we have long been asking and waiting for: real open records reform.
What are the chances? “At this point, the situation in the House is so unstable that making a prediction would be folly,” Erik Arneson, spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi (R-Chester), told the Philadelphia Inquirer.
And anyway, noted Tom Andrews, spokesman for House Majority Leader Bill DeWeese (D-Greene), “At the end of the day, [this] session does not end until Nov. 30, 2008.”
“Most people in their lifetime are going to have a moment when they turn to their government and say: ‘I need some information,’ ” said Charles Davis, the executive director of the National Freedom of Information Coalition at the University of Missouri. “And they don’t realize how vitally important government records can be until it’s vitally important to them.”