Ken Plum: Accessing state government
In my earliest years of service as a member of the House of Delegates there was no guide or directory of state programs and services. Each constituent request that was different from previous ones resulted in an investigation to determine who was responsible for what in the area in which the constituent needed assistance. Sometimes it took several long distance telephone calls to get to the right agency or the right person. There was no Internet and no search engines. State government was not all that friendly, and there were few “800″ numbers to encourage calls from Northern Virginia and other parts of the state into Richmond.
Each successful investigation led to the completion of an index card with individual names, agency names, addresses, and telephone numbers that were eventually expanded to include facsimile telephone numbers to accommodate the new technology. The shoebox that was more than half-full of index cards became an invaluable tool in responding to constituent inquiries.
If it was invaluable to my office, it would clearly be useful to others. From that realization came the idea to print all the information from those index cards in a booklet that would be a citizens handbook. Our first edition was in great demand from citizens, businesses, agencies, and others. It clearly filled a void; it clearly met a need.
Last week I sent out the eleventh edition of my citizens handbook that has now been combined with my constituent guide. It is published every two years. The document is quite different from the first edition. Now users of the handbook are referred to the right website where all the details that were once printed in the guide can be found. It has gone from 24 pages to 8 pages as a result. But with the expansion of the websites the guide opens state government to voters and constituents more than the original print-only version ever could. I organized and chaired the original Joint Commission on Technology and Science (JCOTS) where we placed an emphasis on state government expanding its use of technology and making its programs and services more accessible through the Internet. We have been wonderfully accessible. Virginia state government has received many favorable recognitions for its website.
You should have received the Citizens Handbook and Constituent Guide, Eleventh Edition, last week in the mail. If you did not, call my office weekday mornings at 703.758.9733 or email me at kenplum@aol.com. If you need more copies for your family or business, just let us know the number you need, and we will be glad to provide them. They are not printed at taxpayer expense. They are paid for by my campaign committee.
Ken Plum is a member of the Virginia House of Delegates.
WikiLeaks-Much ado
People with far more expertise in foreign policy than me have weighed in on the impact, such as there has been, of the WikiLeaks disclosures of State Department and intelligence cables.
People with poltiical axes to grind have similarly weighed in on WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange’s high-tech terrorist cred.
Me, I think the guy and the website and the general aims of both are vastly overrated.
I mean, I get it. Assange wants governments across the world to be more open. Me, too. But where do we draw the line?
And yes, there is a line. The secrets have to be uncovered by somebody, after all, and the disclosure of certain secrets is punishable by law. Which isn’t to say that the laws aren’t worth fighting back against, but to me part and parcel to that fight is accepting the punishments that are to come.
More from Chris Graham at TheWorldAccordingToChrisGraham.com.
That’s the essence of civil disobedience, by which the person willfully breaking a law considered to be unjust accepts the consequences of the law-breaking to lay question to the moral authority of the state that enforces it.
The issue to me with the WikiLeaks approach is that it seems to me outside looking in that Assange wants to have it both ways – that he wants to push governments and bureaucracies in the world of big business to be more open while maintaining for himself the ultimate right to secrecy. Case in point: Facing a judge this week regarding an inquiry into allegations of rape and molestation in Sweden, Assange at first tried to claim a PO box as his address, then at further urging wrote an address on a slip of paper and handed the paper to the judge.
So he doesn’t want people to know where he lives, or much else about him, for that matter. That’s fine. He had to know that his crusade for openness would at the same time open his life to the same scrutiny that is his supposed overriding aim.
Another lesson learned. If you’re going to take up a crusade, you’d better be as close to being above reproach as is humanly possible.
My hope, as a strong advocate for openness in government and big business bureaucracy myself, is that this clown doesn’t set back the bigger cause with his shenanigans.
Column by Chris Graham. Chris can be reached at freepress2@ntelos.net.
Ken Plum: Government in the sunshine
Posted by afp on September 19, 2011 · 1 Comment
The precedent last year of the Commission taking a reform proposal written by the distillery interests to sell the ABC stores and endorsing it without adequate independent assessment or public comment resulted in what I believe has to be the most embarrassing situation I have ever seen for a Virginia governor. No one in his own political party that controls the House of Delegates would introduce his bill. A Democrat introduced it and the Republicans refused to even consider it. Special interests working behind the scene created this situation that could have been avoided.
Every governor has a reform commission. It is an expected routine of governance. This commission is much more important than the ones in the past because reducing the size of government is one way to balance the budget. For appointed commission members who are all fine individuals with for the most part limited experience in government to make decisions behind closed doors or at the last minute is not in the best interest of good government. To leave out the individuals on the Commission with the most experience because they are Democrats is Washington-style operating that we cannot allow to invade Richmond
The importance of the current effort is emphasized when terms such as right-sizing and core-services are applied. Clearly there will be an effort to redefine the role of government. Such a debate would be worthwhile to honestly identify the shrinking role of state government with responsibilities being shifted to local government. Everyone, however, needs to know the agenda and the consequences. An open, bipartisan process will permit independent evaluations of proposed changes.
I am proud of the steps that have been taken in Richmond in the years I have been there to open government to public scrutiny, full accountability and disclosure, and public participation. It was not that way under the Democrats who controlled all branches of government when I was first elected. We cannot go back to those days for any reason and certainly not in the guise of government reform. Government must be conducted in the sunshine regardless of how gloomy it might be outside or in the halls of government.
Ken Plum is a member of the Virginia House of Delegates.
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