Open windows on talks to open state
This melody may sound familiar ... Gov. Ned Lamont has a squadron of experts determining landmark state initiatives behind closed doors, without nagging Freedom of Information laws knocking on behalf of a public trying to listen in. A chorus of complaints arose with the first meetings last year of the Partnership for Connecticut, a collaboration between the state and Greenwich hedge fund billionaire Ray Dalio. Our contention remains that those sessions should be public, since they involve taxpayer funds.
We’re not shocked that Lamont doesn’t have an open door policy for the Reopen Connecticut Advisory Group that will advise him on a coronavirus pandemic exit plan. It’s not easy when most of the 47 members are in home headquarters.
It’s an unwieldy group, but the other 3.6 million Connecticut residents deserve to know more about how they conduct business.
We won’t pretend the rest of the state should be able to access every moment of every meeting. Lamont characterizes the panel as working in subcommittees 14 hours a day. That would sound just like a typical spring session of the General Assembly, if only there were minutes and it was visible on a website or cable access channel.
We’ve supported a lot of the governor’s tireless efforts to shepherd the state through this crisis, but he’s a long way from earning Person of the Year at an FOI dinner.
“Hiding the information and decision-making process that inform the advisory group’s recommendations from those it affects most is insulting, counterproductive, and treats the people of Connecticut like subjects, rather than citizens,” said Carol Platt Liebau, president of the Yankee Institute for Public Policy.
House Republican Leader Themis Klarides, who announced last week she will not seek reelection, suggests in an op-ed that Lamont should provide “unfettered access to the decision-making process of the Reopen Connecticut Advisory Group. This is a body that has been given broad authority to determine the economic future of millions of our citizens and our state’s future.”
There’s an appropriate subtext in those words that Lamont has shifted responsibilities away from officials elected by the public to people he hand-picked. Lamont defends the approach with the insistence that the panel will only advise him, but leaving legislators as well as the public on the other side of the closed door is troubling.
There is a chasm between “unfettered” and an outline from Lamont’s camp that occasional updates will be provided and a website will be launched that will invite input from the public.
Because each of the committees includes state officials, any documents produced would be subject to requests under the state’s Freedom of Information laws. First, though, there need to be documents. At the very least, minutes should be taken at the meetings and open to the public.
We encourage Lamont and Co. to ramp up transparency. This is more than a matter of democracy. We are living in historic days that must be archived in Connecticut’s history books.
We’ve supported a lot of the governor’s tireless efforts to shepherd the state through this crisis, but he’s a long way from earning Person of the Year at an FOI dinner.