Gov. Phil Scott said Friday that the Legislature should keep its doors open to the public when the 2022 session convenes in Montpelier, rejecting a proposal to bar everyone but legislators and staff from in-person access to the Statehouse.
“You can’t close the doors to the People’s House. It’s just against everything we stand for,” Scott said during his Friday press conference.
Scott’s comments came after the Legislature received a report last week that offered recommendations on how lawmakers can conduct safe in-person business next year. The Statehouse is crowded when the Legislature is in session, most committee rooms are tiny and ventilation has been a problem.
The report, produced by the Burlington architecture firm Freeman French Freeman, presented one option that would ban the press and public from the Statehouse, with legislative proceedings streamed online.
While some legislative staff members favor the proposal, it has been sharply criticized by the state’s press corps.
The Democratic leaders of the House and Senate have both said they won’t resume in-person business in the Statehouse without providing some access to the press and public.
Scott said he believes that once he lifts the state’s emergency order for the Covid-19 crisis, it should be safe for legislators to resume in-person business.
The Scott administration plans to lift most Covid-19 restrictions by July 4, as more Vermonters get vaccinated against the virus.
“From my standpoint, my perspective, I don’t see any reason why they couldn’t go back into session after we lift the emergency order. We feel it will be as safe as it was pre-pandemic,” Scott said.
While lawmakers are committed to meeting in Montpelier next January, they are just beginning to formulate what legislative business will look like as the state looks to emerge from the most severe pandemic restrictions
They also have started taking testimony from other interested parties, including staff, media organizations and lobbyists.
On Thursday, members of the press insisted that, if lawmakers return to the Statehouse next year, media organizations need access to the proceedings.
While lawmakers have opposed the idea of blocking the public from the Statehouse entirely, some have floated limiting capacity in committee rooms while maintaining online livestreams of the proceedings.
On Friday, a group of lobbyists offered their thoughts on returning to the Statehouse, and some raised concerns about limiting the number of people who can be inside committee rooms.
Speaking to the Senate Committee on Institutions, Patti Komline, a lobbyist with the firm Downs Rachlin Martin, said she would like to see “equal access or inaccess” to in-person committee hearings next year.
“If you’re saying ‘One more person can be in there,’ my personal feeling is don’t have anyone in there, which may mean that your meetings are closed, but the rest of the building is open access,” Komline said.
“Sitting in that room does give people an advantage, and I don’t know how you could do first-come, first-served in that situation,” she said.
Austin Davis, a lobbyist with the Lake Champlain Chamber of Commerce, also raised concerns about taking a “first-come, first served” approach to who can sit with lawmakers in committee rooms.
He told the committee it would “degrade folks’ trust in the process a little bit because they start wondering why is it that person, why not other people.”
He said legislators should find a way to ensure that the public can return to the Statehouse next year before they think about bringing themselves back into the building.
“Any conversation about coming back needs to be, first of all, how do we bring the public back to the Statehouse?” Davis said.
“It is the people’s house. It needs to be first and foremost how do we get the people into the house, and second how do we get the legislators into the house with their constituents.”
Discussions of Statehouse access could extend well into the fall, legislative leaders have said.
