Open and transparent? We must have missed it — The Bluegrass Institute for Public Policy Solutions

The Lexington Herald-Leader's most recent editorial is titled "Kudos to legislature for opening budget negotiations". Unbelievable.

For the record, budget negotiations for the 2012 General Assembly were not open -- unless you consider the presence of one lone public-TV camera as a great example of transparency.

In fact, the paper says all you need to know in the body of the editorial when they contradicted the title:

The budget conference committee meetings were not open to the public but were broadcast by KET...

The Lexington Herald-Leader cannot speak firsthand on how open the meetings were because they were not in the room. How do I know that? Because press was not allowed. Having one camera in a room does not make a process open and transparent. The Bluegrass Institute pointed this out and asked these questions:

Why was the press not allowed to attend these negotiations?
Why were legislators not on the budget committee not encouraged to attend?
Why did the budget committee need an armed guard?
Why was the hallway roped-off?

Perhaps the Herald-Leader didn't see the picture of the hallway outside the room where negotiations were taking place. I'm not sure how anyone could sell these recent negotiations as open and transparent.