More on Bloggers' Press Credentials

by Karl Kurtz

Jill Miller Zimon has written "Beyond the wonks: access to Ohio's legislature" in her blog, Writes Like She Talks (a clever name, except that her writing belies the title--either that or she talks well), about how the Ohio Legislative Correspondents Association controls media credentials for the Ohio General Assembly.  Thus far, no bloggers have been credentialed in the Ohio legislature. 

In her post (which also appears in a Cleveland Plain Dealer blog) she has included the language of the Ohio Senate rules that gives that control to the incumbent reporters.  These rules say in part:

...[T]he Ohio Legislative Correspondents’ Association...shall see that the privileges of the floor be granted to representatives of the press association serving newspapers of general circulation, bona fide correspondents of reputable standing in their profession who represent newspapers of general circulation or magazines, or representatives of daily legislative information services of known standing and integrity, or their affiliates; organized for that one purpose and not controlled by or connected with an association, firm, corporation, or individual representing any trade, profession, or other commercial enterprise, and which have been in continuous and bona fide operation for such a period of years immediately prior to the date of making application for floor privileges as will have made possible the establishment of a reputation for honesty and integrity....

Whew, that's quite a mouthful--and quite a mountain for bloggers to climb, if they want to obtain press credentials!  Jill says that she plans to challenge the rule by seeking credentials for herself in the future.

Allowing the correspondents' association to manage press credentials is a classic approach to occupational licensing--let the incumbents control entry to the profession.  I've never paid much attention to the subject of press credentials in legislatures. When I looked this subject up in Inside the Legislative Process, I found that it's a fairly common practice: press associations determine accreditation of reporters in 27 of the 99 state legislative chambers. 

As the saga of bloggers' press credentials unfolds, it will be interesting to see if bloggers are less likely to get press credentials in chambers where the press associations are responsible for accreditation than from others (presiding officers, rules committees or appropriate staff offices) who perform this task.

We have written about the topic of bloggers' press credentials before in The Thicket in "Bloggers Get Press Credentials" and "A Victory for Bloggers."  In a poll that we posted on this subject, three-quarters of the respondents said that they believed that bloggers should be given press credentials, if they meet certain specified criteria.

Do any legislative junkies have recent updates to offer to these stories?

Comments

[Jill]

Thanks so much, Karl. And, no less than Joe Hallett, senior editor at the Columbus Dispatch and a fellow panelist at the AAPC's academic outreach three weeks ago told me that indeed, I do write like a talk! So there. :)

Now, you know I love this blog, so I hope you don't mind if I offer one correction:

I didn't exactly write I plan "to challenge the rule by seeking credentials for herself in the future." I do plan to investigate the, um - elasticity of the rules, shall we say? Which, I suspect, will have more to do with the elasticity of the legislators and the current OLCA members.

I know that, realistically, the likelihood of my being in the statehouse reporting more than a few times a year is quite low. But I believe that bloggers - certainly not all, but some - could very, very aptly assist in coverage.

This is a huge, diverse state. We have a large, diverse blogosphere. There's a lot of unhappiness with our state legislature.

The chairman of a committee agreed that he screwed up and now has to go back and fix a law that he himself says he must not have followed closely enough.

Seems to me that the officials could stand to be followed more closely then. And bloggers - who, at their best, see things in that hyperlocal way we all talk about - could really, really be an asset.

At least - that's what I think, obviously. :)

As for me getting credentialed - let me put it this way: if I were able to help design a system of credentialing for bloggers that I felt would serve Ohio residents and news consumers well, and I didn't get credentialed, that would just have to be okay.

Then - I'd figure out way to meet the requirements. :)

I'm not exactly Rodney Dangerfield (I think it was him) when it comes to, "I don't want to belong to a club that would have me in it."

Thanks again for finding my post on this subject - now THAT'S impressive!

[Jill]

Karl - according to a comment left at Wide Open, ePluribusMedia requested credentials from the OLCA on 9/21. I'm making some contact with ePluribus to see what's up. I wasn't familiar with them before they left the comment.

[Karl Kurtz]

Thanks for the updates, Jill. Sorry to misconstrue your plans to get press credentials. That quote about clubs is from Groucho Marx, not Rodney Dangerfield.

[Jill]

Hi Karl -

Thanks for the correction on Dangerfield - I never have been able to watch all of Caddyshack - not really my style.

Also - I bet you've seen it but the demise of the Wide Open blog isn't exactly NCSL fare, but it does have to do with the co-existence of political blogging and newspaper blogs written by political reporters. It would be interesting, over time, to learn how candidates and elected officials do or do not treat these two groups differently, and under which circumstances.

Poynter and Editor & Publisher probably did the best coverage, I think.

Poynter is here:
http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=31&aid=132398

E&P is here:
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003667445

I can't remember if typepad will take links.