BATH

When state Rep. Jennifer DeChant, D-Bath, stopped someone with a camera from recording a constituent meeting, she had no idea that the move would be controversial at all. But in the aftermath, some constituents and one former legislator say she violated Maine’s public meeting laws.

The story begins a couple weeks ago, when DeChant received several emails about a bill she’s sponsoring to renew the Shipbuilding Facility Tax Credit, a tax benefit specifically designed to help Bath Iron Works that is set to expire next year.

“What happened … is that I had received emails from 8-10 people, who wrote form letter emails listing statistics about BIW and saying that I need to stay away from BIW and BIW tax credits,” DeChant said. “I invited those 10 people to meet with me so we could talk about how the bill began and how they can be involved in the bill going forward.”

Of the 10 she reached out to, only four replied. DeChant originally planned to meet with them at a private residence, but later moved the meeting to Bath City Hall due to a scheduling conflict. But when she showed up to the meeting on Dec. 21, DeChant was surprised to see more people than she had invited.

“Those four people, on their own, broadcasted it among their networks without me knowing it, which is their right, certainly,” said DeChant. “Then when I moved it to a larger venue — still expecting four people because I had four agendas made — they thought I was making it bigger.”

DeChant said that perhaps the onus was on her to clarify that she was expecting to talk to only four people despite the venue, but it was never communicated to her that the constituents she invited were in turn inviting their network of people to attend.

Ultimately, eight people showed up for the meeting, including two from outside of her district. Sen. Eloise Vitelli, D-Arrowsic, the bill’s sponsor in the Senate, also attended. While all accounts seem to agree that the meeting itself was amicable, DeChant’s decision to turn away an individual looking to film the meeting has proven controversial.

In DeChant’s telling, it seemed absurd to her that someone would try to record an informal meeting with a handful of constituents about a bill that hasn’t even been written yet.

“Then, the TV camera from somewhere with some public access comes in, and I’m like: This is four people!” said DeChant. “My confusion, and my error, was that what I thought was meeting with four people who had contacted me about an issue to help them understand the context of what we were going to be operating in, had blown up to what they thought was a public meeting.”

In a later email, DeChant added that she wanted her constituents to be able to speak openly and freely without worrying about a camera.

Bath resident Mary Beth Sullivan said she showed up late to the meeting, and wasn’t aware that the person with the camera, a friend of hers, had been turned away until later.

“I don’t know what happened, whether she was asked simply not to tape record, or whether she was asked to leave,” said Sullivan. “I don’t understand why that would be. When I look back on that meeting there was nothing that occurred in that meeting that shouldn’t have been heard by every voter in Maine.”

In the aftermath, Sullivan said she heard from some attendees and other individuals that the fact that DeChant had not allowed the meeting to be filmed could, in fact, be a violation of Maine’s public meetings law. In an email, former Rep. Jeffrey Evangelos, who is unenrolled from Friendship, made the most explicit claim that a violation of the law occurred, going so far as to claim that “everything we do as legislators is public.”

“A meeting of legislators and members of the public at City Hall is a public meeting and is subject to all FOAA requirements,” Evangelos said. “State law also says you are allowed to videotape and record what are clearly public proceedings. (The camera person) had an absolute right to tape this proceeding and she should have refused to leave and told Rep. DeChant she was violating the law. In public business, there is no such thing as an informal meeting, everything we do as legislators is public.”

However, Sigmund Schutz, a lawyer with Preti Flaherty who co-authored a guide to Maine’s public meetings and records laws, said that there was likely no violation of the law.

“A meeting just between constituents and a legislator probably isn’t subject to the public records law, in that it wouldn’t be a meeting of a public body,” said Schutz.

One complicating factor is that at the last minute, the meeting was moved to City Hall, a public building. But even so, it’s not clear that all meetings in public facilities fall under the purview of Maine’s public meeting law. For instance, in some cases discussions between municipal officials and business interests can occur in private, even in a public building. Few people would assert the right to sit in a city manager’s office with a camera all day. While Maine’s public meetings law is meant to be interpreted liberally, it doesn’t cover everything done by public officials, or everything that occurs in a public building.

Even adding in the factor that the incident occurred in a public facility, Schutz concluded that Maine’s public meetings law probably didn’t apply to the situation.

“I don’t think it would be subject to the freedom of access act,” he said.

Irwin Gratz, a broadcast journalist and past national president of the Society of Professional Journalists, agreed that DeChant likely did not violate the law by turning away the camera person. But according to Gratz, debating the legality of the incident misses the larger point.

“We have legislators, meeting with constituents, in a public place, presumably talking about public policy, but excluding some members of the public,” said Gratz in an email. “This clearly violates the spirit of our ‘open government’ laws, even if the laws themselves allow it.”

“The law probably does allow this. But it shouldn’t,” Gratz added. “This really shows the need for us to tighten our open government laws, especially when it comes to legislators.”

In a follow-up email, DeChant maintained that she had not violated the law, noting that her intention was never to discuss the merits or substance of the bill, but to simply explain to her constituents how they could be involved in the legislative process.

But legal or not, DeChant said she has learned her lesson, and in the future she will not turn away anybody looking to record any such meeting.

“What I do understand is that I won’t do that again. A public meeting is a public meeting,” said DeChant. “If I meet with two people, if I meet with four people, if I meet with 400 people, anybody can bring a camera.”

nstrout@timesrecord.com