by Daniel Schuman and Cassandra LaRussa

Despite significant strides towards improving public access to legislative proceedings, nearly a quarter of House hearings cannot be watched online despite recently instituted House rules – with the Appropriations Committee as the biggest offender, with 70 percent of its hearings unavailable on the Internet.

The Sunlight Foundation tracked 200 House hearings over 20 days to determine whether they were webcast live, plus 407 hearings from January 17 to April 2 to determine whether video from the proceedings were archived online. Twenty-five percent (489 of 200) of the hearings were not live-streamed, and 22 percent (91 of 407) were not archived on committee websites.

While these numbers, at first glance, indicate broad non-compliance with House rules, in reality, nearly all committees did a good or excellent job of live-streaming and archiving their videos online. The major offender was the House Appropriations Committee, which is at the heart of today's debate about the budget and is responsible for writing the chamber's spending bills.

Of the 489 hearings that were not live-streamed, 47 were Appropriations Committee hearings (Armed Services was the other one*and Foreign Affairs were the other two). Similarly, of the 91 hearings that did not have video archived on the committee website, 74 were Appropriations Committee hearings.

In short, the House Appropriations Committee is keeping the public in the dark.

The House's Online Video Rule

In January 2011, the House of Representatives adopted new rules requiring that video coverage of hearings be available online. "To the maximum extent practicable, each committee shall --- (a) provide audio and video coverage of each hearing ... in a manner that allows the public to easily listen to and view the proceedings; and (b) maintain the recordings of such coverage in a manner that is easily accessible to the public."

This was part of Speaker Boehner's commitment to open up the legislative process to the public. He explained that "the internet offers new opportunities to open the halls of Congress to Americans in every corner of our nation."

Live webstreams and video archives are a way to bring Congress closer to the people. The privately-run cable network C-SPAN cannot cover every hearing, and it's unreasonable to expect people to travel to DC to be in attendance. Combined with cutbacks in newsroom staffs around the country, less prominent issues are unlikely to be covered by local media.

Appropriations in the Dark

Unfortunately, the Appropriations Committee has often declined to video-record its proceedings. Last year, I described a hearing on the House's budget that was not televised and was held in a room so small few people could attend. This February, I took photos at another hearing to show the public what they were missing (and that making a recording would be relatively painless).

When we spoke with the Appropriations Committee's press office last year about recording its proceedings, we received the following response:

Whenever logistically possible, the main committee room - which is equipped with webcast and video capabilities - is used for hearings and mark-ups.

The Committee schedules rooms for hearings and mark ups based upon many factors, including but not limited to: space availability, accessibility for members and the public, physical proximity to the house floor to accommodate voting schedules, and room size. Committee hearing rooms are also used for a variety of other purposes such as meetings and briefings. In addition, we allow any credentialed media organization to tape and/or record our open hearings and mark-ups, no matter which room is being used.

With 70 percent of its hearings offline, the Committee's practice appears to diverge from the House's requirement of publishing video online to "the maximum extent practicable." Nearly all other committees manage to put their proceedings online. Appropriators have a large hearing room that has cameras pre-installed. Were the committee to choose to meet in the Capitol building, it could request coverage from the House Recording Studio or meet in one of the new hearing rooms in the Capitol Visitor's Center.

Survey of House Video Sources

We looked at both individual committee websites and the Library of Congress THOMAS website to determine video availability.

We found that committee websites were generally easy to navigate. Specific pages devoted to hearings included a chronological list with links to the archived webcasts, as well as testimony from witnesses and a live-streaming function. This demonstrates a significant improvement based on our past evaluation of committee websites and a serious attempt to address Sunlight’s past suggestions.

The Library of Congress recently began publishing hearing videos on THOMAS at the urging of the House. Unfortunately, the website is very difficult to use and navigate. While recordings are sensibly organized by committee, they are given impenetrable names like "USHR07 Armed Services Committee." Is that a full committee or subcommittee hearing? What is the name of the hearing? Occasionally recordings are titled by the date and time of the hearing, but this is not done consistently. Generally, they are only labeled by "date created," which may or may not be the date the hearing took place. And if multiple hearings took place on the same day, it's difficult to tell them apart.

In reviewing the committee websites against what's available on THOMAS, we found 9 of the 91 videos that were missing from the committees’ websites. The Ways and Means Committee has failed to post 5 videos on its website that are available on THOMAS; the Small Business Committee has missed 2; and the Appropriations Committee and the Budget Committee have each missed one. That still leaves 83 hearing that are not archived online from the time we monitored.

There have been important efforts to fill in the gaps. Carl Malamud and the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform have together published online over 1,100 committee hearing videos from 1993 to the present.

The American people have a right to see what their government is doing. In the upcoming months, appropriators in particular will make important decisions about how trillions of dollars are spent. It's time to allow everyone to watch this online in real-time, as promised in the House rules.

 

Methodology: We undertook a best effort to monitor live webcasts of committee hearings between February 27 and March 9 and March 26 to April 2, but we couldn't catch them all. For any webcast that we did not watch as it took place, we called the committee to determine whether one took place.

Because there is no official and complete source for all committee hearings, it's likely that we missed some of the archival hearings. In addition, we only monitored hearings during the first quarter of 2012. Some committees may not have met during that time period. Others may have been particularly active. This research was intended as a snapshot of committee compliance with House rules on making livestreams and video archives available.

Finally, our list of archival video on committee websites is accurate as of the date of review. It’s possible additional video was posted after we completed our survey.

Update: We have been assured by Foreign Affairs Committee that the hearing we identified as not having been webcast was in fact streamed live. The hearing was delayed by a half an hour, so it was not webstreamed at the announced start time, but apparently was available at the delayed start time.

Photo Credit: the test pattern is from Gak on Flickr.

 

 

Working on our short documentary series called OpenGov Champions I get to go and hang out with some extremely smart, creative and inspiring people. The Champions are ordinary citizens who do some extraordinary work to open up their local government data in big or small ways, not because someone asked them to, but because they are either fed up with not having access to information they need or simply because want their communities to flourish. To me, this is far more interesting as a storyteller and documentary filmmaker than interviewing seasoned politicians, spokespeople or experts. These are the kind of stories that are the fodder of classic storytelling and moviemaking. They are real life stories of the quintessential American heroes: Ones who defeat the odds by taking the matters into their own hands and create real change by strong will, passion and hard work.

Working on these mini documentaries is the favorite part of my job. The Champions open up their homes to me and I get to spend a few hours interviewing and getting to know them, and then a week or so putting the video together. As I watch the raw footage over and over again, looking for core of the story, I feel like I really get to know them quite well. And I always have a hard time with the inevitable elimination of footage, (called “killing your darlings” in editor talk.) They always say so many interesting things with insight, humor and wisdom that I would love everyone to hear. Yet I need to cut a lot out to get to the heart of the story and tell it in about three minutes.

I was first a little nervous calling Laura Amico to talk about doing a video about her. I had heard about Homicide Watch DC, and the imagery it had sprung in my mind was of some hardened-by-life, don’t-mess-with-me reporter straight from a film noir movie. You’d have to be to handle all that horror and heartbreak associated with homicide reporting, right? But I was relieved to find that she was none of that. To the contrary. When my coworker Kevin and I went to interview Laura and her husband Chris, who also works on the site, their warm and tranquil apartment smelled of something delicious cooking. They were a delight to work with. We stayed for more than three hours and yet they gracefully kept talking to us despite it getting late and their dinner delayed. In the course of the interview she explained that even though it is hard work sometimes, what makes it worth it is that they have been able to create this place where families and friends, teachers and co workers of victims -- and suspects for that matter -- can find information they need and support each other through the tough times. I find it remarkable that she can keep on doing this work without becoming the toughened reporter I imagined her to be in the process.

The story of Homicide Watch shows how open data and government transparency touch upon a wide variety of issues and affect so many different groups of people. Be it environmental, political, civil rights related, social, or any other small or big cause, it will likely at some point benefit from open and easy access to government data. In Laura’s case, it is violent crime data from the courts and police departments in DC.

I am not really a wonk. But I do care about transparency and openness in our government. Talking to the OpenGov Champions to me speaks more about the OpenGov movement than the more technological or political chatter you hear so much here in D.C. What I, and many others like me need in order to “get it” is a story, a human face that can connect the dots for us and show us what others do and that we can do that too. And I believe most of us need inspiration from others from time to time. Meeting the people who participate in the OpenGov movement in their own ways makes it real to me and makes me feel I'm part of a larger community.

It gives me hope to see that I don’t have to run for office or know the secret handshake in order to make change. Ordinary people coming together are what it takes -- sharing stories like this one and using them to build support for real change -- for transparency and openness in all our communities. That’s why we started this series, and I hope you all can gather around this modern version of the campfire and enjoy the story.

Sunlight couldn't be in better company in the following video shot by the Omidyar Network, a significant funder of our work. The interviews done at a recent event in Menlo Park, California includes leaders from the Wikimedia Foundation, BRAC, the African Leadership Academy, Ushahidi, DonorsChoose.org, Landesa and IGNIA. What truly amazing partners they are.

We could elaborate, I suppose, but this quick video really says it all:

In case you missed it, I wanted to share this message that Ellen Miller, our Executive Director, sent out this morning:

I wanted to take the time to thank you for your support of our work this year. This has been a big year for Sunlight, but an even bigger year for transparency. This year, Americans awakened to the realities of money, power and politics, and we’re proud of the work we’ve done to promote transparency as a fundamental value of the movement to restore democracy.

Rather than rattling off all the projects we’ve worked on this year, I’d like to share a video with you that highlights some of the amazing work being done by Sunlighters -- not just our staff, but also the amazing transparency activists we work with throughout the country and the world.

We’ve only come this far because of your support -- and I hope you’ll contribute today to help us continue shining sunlight to new horizons: sunlightfoundation.com/donate/2011

Thanks for all of your support, and from all of the Sunlight team, happy holidays!

Ellen S. Miller Executive Director Sunlight Foundation

P.S. -- In the spirit of some holiday fun, Sunlight Labs has created an interactive holiday game that I'd like to share with you. Play it here: http://sunlightfoundation.com/happyholidays/

From the stream of news coming from Congress about the budget, one might think that committee meetings and legislation on federal spending would be easily accessible online. That's often not true.

For example, the legislative text for four major appropriations bills are not yet online despite their apparent approval by both the full Senate Appropriations Committee yesterday and the relevant subcommittees prior to that. The four missing Senate bills are: Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2012; Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2012; Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, 2012; and Legislative Branch Appropriations Act, 2012. The public's only chance to see the legislation is after all the important decisions have been made. By comparison, the House generally makes legislation considered by committees available to the public prior to votes.

None of the Senate committee reports for these bills are available online, either, except for the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act, which is on THOMAS. The reports explain the decisions by appropriators and often provide significant guidance on how money will be spent.

Senate Appropriators do release streaming audio of subcommittee markups, although the audio feed isn't always reliable. The House, by contrast, will live stream video of its markups, but only when the committee finds it convenient; it often does not broadcast meetings at all. This goes against the spirit -- and likely the letter -- of the new House Rules passed by the 112th Congress.

Unfortunately, the best way to look at the legislation and reports in a timely way is often by using expensive private news services. Congress owes the public a better explanation of what it's doing.

by Jacob Hutt, Policy Intern

Twenty years after its first video pilot study, the federal court system has launched a digital video pilot study in fourteen federal trial courts. What changed? This study seeks to enhance “public access” to courtroom footage, whereas the first study was geared towards providing “media access” to courtroom footage, said Judge Julie A. Robinson, Chair of the Judicial Conference Committee on Court Administration and Case Management.

Judge Robinson cited a decline in the “cost and obtrusiveness of video equipment” in explaining why the second study has come about. But this pilot program has serious limitations. Video will not be permitted in criminal proceedings; both parties must consent; and appellate courts are not included. While cameras in the court are not the be-all and end-all of judicial transparency, as we've written elsewhere, these baby steps come long after the Internet has grown up (and TV has entered senescence).

A number of state courts already make available video feeds. The federal courts should run to catch up.

Will the American people be able to watch online as members of Congress discuss how much money to spend on the House of Representatives next year? Probably not, as this Thursday's hearing will take place in a room without cameras, even through the main committee room is wired to the internet and apparently available.*

The in-person-only nature of the hearing conflicts with the newly adopted House Rules, which require “to the maximum extent practicable, each committee shall --”

provide audio and video coverage of each hearing or meeting for the transaction of business in a manner that allows the public to easily listen to and view the proceedings.

Last year, Speaker Boehner moved to ensure that the House Rules Committee could broadcasting video of its proceedings in its main hearing room. At the time, he said, “given the important business conducted there, we feel strongly that the American people should have the ability to watch the Committee in action.” The same argument can be made here.

In light of the serious and important efforts being undertaken by the House leadership to move Congress into the electronic age, the Appropriations Committee should hold its hearings as possible in the main room whenever possible, starting with this one, until cameras are installed in its subcommittee rooms.

~ Phone calls requesting comment were not immediately returned, but I do hope to have an update when we hear back.

Every February 2nd, optimists around the country turn to a furry little rodent in Western Pennyslvania, hoping that this year Punxsutawney Phil’s shadow won’t appear -- spring could be just around the corner!

The rest of us? We just expect more of the same: more winter, more shadows and more news about “shadowy” special interests clouding our government. Lobbying disclosure -- clearing away the shadows around the special interests in Washington -- is stuck in a “Groundhog Day” time loop.

We’re in a day and age where services like Twitter, Foursquare, and Gowalla let millions overshare publicly (online and in real time!) about each and every trip to their favorite burger joint or doctor’s visit. It’s absurd that the information that affects us all remains in the shadows -- like when and how lobbyists for wealthy special interests are meeting with lawmakers and influencing policy.

The new Congress means we have the chance to improve the Lobbying Disclosure Act, to bring the aging legislation up to the speed and fix the current loopholes.

Through PublicMarkup.org, Sunlight is openly drafting the Real Time Online Lobbying Transparency Act, which would amend the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 to foster a new system of real-time online disclosure of lobbying activities. We want to improve the democratic process by deterring and rooting out corruption, showcasing what issues are being discussed in Washington and improving the public access to government activity. We welcome and encourage your review and comments on the proposed legislation and hope to incorporate improvements from collaborators in the final draft.

This Groundhog Day, don’t accept the "politics as usual" rhetoric. With your support, we can break the cycle and institute meaningful lobbying reform that will bring the people influencing our government out of the shadows and into the Sunlight.

To get regular updates or to join the campaign for lobbying disclosure reform, sign up on our Lobbying Reform site.

In a letter released today, the Sunlight Foundation and Main Street Insider called upon the House of Representatives to improve how it makes floor and committee videos available online. We also requested that the House to provide a centrally located and frequently updated website with aggregated listings of all committee events and floor schedules.

Although the House has made great strides in opening up its proceedings to the public, much more should be done. Making available high quality video with minimal restrictions and maximum capability for reuse would go a long way towards allowing citizens to engage in the discussions of national importance that take place in the people’s house.

House of Representatives Should Improve Its Video

As we wind down the year, I want to take this moment to thank all of you wholeheartedly for your interest and support of Sunlight’s work in 2010. This has been a tremendous year for Sunlight and for government transparency. We’ve witnessed progress in Washington to create online disclosure for the work of government, but we’ve also seen very unfortunate set-backs that have curtailed decades worth of campaign finance restrictions and disclosure requirements. Our own work has developed in new directions, from mobile to real-time investigative reporting to increasingly collaborative with grassroots allies across the country. We fostered a new ‘data commons’ and a series of sites that make campaign finance, lobbying, earmark and government contract data more accessible, and we started making great strides in assessing how to help open up state legislatures.

During 2010, Sunlight also had some fun, broke some news and our Reporting Group made it easier for you to see who was spending $455 million during the election.

But better than listing every activity from 2010, I’d like to share the embedded video below, which highlights some of the achievements from this remarkable year of discovery, innovation and progress – made possible through the generosity of many of you.

The coming year will see an expansion of Sunlight’s efforts as we build new tools and websites to enable easy access to critical government data, advocate for new laws to require that such data is available 24/7 online, train hundreds of journalists and citizens in how to use those tools, create the narrative that shows how powerful lobbyists hold sway over Washington, and communicate to the broader public the power of openness and transparency to restore faith and participation in our democratic process.

I look forward to sharing that with all of you next year.

From all of us at the Sunlight Foundation, warmest wishes for a wonderful holiday season!