Senate committees should allow cameras
“In addition to the transmissions provided for in Senate Rule 9-5-8, photography, video or audio recording or transmission of committee proceedings may, upon request, be allowed with the permission of the chair and ranking member is also allowed.”
This is a portion of a very smart resolution introduced by Democratic state Sen. Jeff Steinborn of Las Cruces, designed to allow cameras in Senate committee hearings as a matter of course rather than choice.
Had this resolution been in place, a TV reporter and her camera would not have been kicked out of the Senate Conservation Committee last week.
Here’s what happened instead. Rachel Knapp — who covers the Legislature for KRQE-TV — was filming the committee’s deliberations on a hazardous waste bill.
Democratic Sen. Antoinette Sedillo Lopez, vice chairwoman of the committee, interrupted the meeting to ask whether Knapp had permission to be filming.
Republican Sen. Pat Woods piped up to speak out about the camera. He is quoted on the KRQE Channel 13 video of the incident as saying, “I just prefer this not to be spliced and edited to be used against someone.”
Sedillo Lopez said, “I’m sorry, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”
That is unacceptable.
Print reporters do not have to ask permission to take notes and cover committees. Broadcast journalists and photographers should be treated no differently. It’s a reporter’s job to cover what is happening, whether events take place in a committee meeting or outside the Roundhouse. No permission necessary.
This is true for ordinary citizens, too, the ones who show up not for work but because they care. If citizens want to attend committee hearings and record testimony and debate, no permission should be necessary. Open government for all should be the rule.
Senate Resolution 2, Steinborn’s bill, would eliminate the need for reporters and others to ask permission.
If legislators truly believe the public has the right to see the goings on at the state Legislature, they will adopt Steinborn’s resolution.
We point out two other things. The desire for secrecy, as we saw in this instance, is bipartisan. Sedillo Lopez is a Democrat, Wood a Republican.
Also, other senators sit on this committee, including Liz Stefanics, D-Cerrillos. She is normally chairwoman of the committee but was presenting a bill when the incident occurred. It seems to us that she and other legislators could have spoken up in support of the reporter, perhaps calling a quick recess to ask Sedillo Lopez to reconsider. That apparently did not happen.
Stefanics says she supports transparency and would favor Steinborn’s rule change. Really? Prove it. We don’t mean Stefanics alone, but Senate Majority Leader Peter Wirth and all other senators who say they believe the public has a right to know the business of the Senate.
Let reporters do their jobs. Let citizens make videos. The business of the Senate — especially at all-important committee meetings when testimony occurs and substitutions are made — must be public. Anything less is unacceptable, just like what happened last week.