Lawmakers, media discuss do's, don'ts

TV, radio and newspaper reporters and the nation's legislators have a love/hate relationship — they both need each other, they both have important jobs to do, and they both want the public to believe them.

A panel of leading journalists and legislators Thursday told the National Conference of State Legislatures that progress can be made on both sides — reporters and legislators — to better serve their publics. But completely seeing eye-to-eye may never be possible.

"Don't ever lie to me. The first time you lie to me is the last time I believe you," said Robert Priddy, board chairman of the Radio-Television News Directors Association. Priddy has covered the Missouri Legislature for 30 years.

Kentucky Senate President David Williams agrees — legislators should be honest.

But he says lying lawmakers is not really the problem — biased reporting is his complaint.

The editors of two major newspapers in his state have told him to his face that their goal is to remove Republicans from the Senate majority, he said. And the firewall between the papers' editorial stands (where he is regularly lampooned in cartoons and print) and news reporting — if there ever was a firewall — is down, Williams said. The newspapers' reporters and editors "have an agenda," he added.

Clearly, there are some legislatures where reporters and legislators don't share a lot of trust, comments by the panel showed.

But a new survey by NCSL of 60 legislators and 100 journalists shows they don't disagree that often on many issues common for the media and legislators, such as mistake-free reporting and ethical political conduct.

The journalists and lawmakers generally think the other side is ethical and tries to do what's right, the survey found.

But while journalists believe they do a pretty good job informing the public about what legislators are doing, lawmakers disagree. Most said reporting is not thorough enough.

Utah House Speaker Marty Stephens, outgoing president of NCSL this year, will retire from the Legislature in December. Asked after the panel how the Utah media has covered him over his dozen years in office and six as House speaker, Stephens said, by and large, it's been pretty fair.

"One of the major newspapers in town, however, has an (anti-Legislature) agenda. We've seen it for years," Stephens said. "And it is unfortunate."