The 9 Ballot Questions

Okay, so question one is about extending the public records law in Massachusetts to cover the governor and the state legislature.

My favorite.

Woo! Ow, ow, ow!

The thing that I always like to note to people when talking about the backstory to this, so folks here might remember, and you might not, but a decade ago was the last time that Massachusetts did a big update to the public records law.

And they did a number of important things that dealt with different fees and deadlines and timelines.

But one thing that they didn't do was extend the public records law to cover themselves and the governor.

They created a commission to do that instead or to look into that instead.

And that commission met and it held hearings and it heard from folks at Common Cause, the ACLU, the League of Women Voters, the News Leaders Association, and then it dissolved without recommendations.

That's why that's how they keep us busy without changing anything.

Exactly.

Yep.

And I'm setting the stage for a lot of the transparency fights in the year since.

Yeah, I'll just say really quickly, my favorite thing to say about this, because they often say like, oh, but we need to protect people as if most of the things that happen aren't in the public, if public hearings, things that should be in the public, but they're like, we need to protect people.

And I always say like...

District attorneys are subject to open meeting laws that clearly those people have more delicate things that they need to protect people's identities and they can somehow manage to comply with open meeting laws.

But our legislators on the off chance somebody wants to share testimony that's that's maybe shouldn't be public, which is like maybe once a year, one person a year.

They somehow need to have no oversight for the off chance this may occur.

And it's just bonkers and ridiculous.

And it really is just like we need to be able to see what they're doing.

That's the first and bottom step to the many other reforms we need.

How many other states are not subject to public health

laws?

How many

other state legislatures? Any? No, it's a handful of them.

I believe that the total number is under 10 of the 50 states.

Okay, so question one is about extending the public records law in Massachusetts to cover the governor and the state legislature.

My favorite.

Woo! Ow, ow, ow!

The thing that I always like to note to people when talking about the backstory to this, so folks here might remember, and you might not, but a decade ago was the last time that Massachusetts did a big update to the public records law.

And they did a number of important things that dealt with different fees and deadlines and timelines.

But one thing that they didn't do was extend the public records law to cover themselves and the governor.

They created a commission to do that instead or to look into that instead.

And that commission met and it held hearings and it heard from folks at Common Cause, the ACLU, the League of Women Voters, the News Leaders Association, and then it dissolved without recommendations.

That's why that's how they keep us busy without changing anything.

Exactly.

Yep.

And I'm setting the stage for a lot of the transparency fights in the year since.

Yeah, I'll just say really quickly, my favorite thing to say about this, because they often say like, oh, but we need to protect people as if most of the things that happen aren't in the public, if public hearings, things that should be in the public, but they're like, we need to protect people.

And I always say like...

District attorneys are subject to open meeting laws that clearly those people have more delicate things that they need to protect people's identities and they can somehow manage to comply with open meeting laws.

But our legislators on the off chance somebody wants to share testimony that's that's maybe shouldn't be public, which is like maybe once a year, one person a year.

They somehow need to have no oversight for the off chance this may occur.

And it's just bonkers and ridiculous.

And it really is just like we need to be able to see what they're doing.

That's the first and bottom step to the many other reforms we need.

How many other states are not subject to public health

laws?

How many

other state legislatures? Any? No, it's a handful of them.

I believe that the total number is under 10 of the 50 states.