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The courts’ lag in keeping up with technological advances in American society could slow efforts to open government meetings to broader media access. That’s the word from Teresa Nelson, attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Minnesota, who is watching the current battle over limits on media access at the state House of Representatives with an eye to take possible action.

The struggle to get cameras and new media in places where government gathers,  from the state Capitol to county board rooms, is hampered by case law that, in its outlook on technology, is sometimes stuck in the 1970s.

The ACLU-MN is looking at the current ban on online-only media from the floor of the state House of Representatives, the source of a slow-burn dispute that got white-hot this week when new House rules — largely withdrawn, apparently — threatened the working ways of long-established media outlets.

The mediums of video and the Internet are following in the the hard-won footsteps of radio and television in gaining access to government, Nelson said.

The civil liberties group understands the legislature’s problem of limited space on the House floor, Nelson said, but wants to see neutral criteria for the granting of press credentials. Also at issue is a ban on cameras in House committees for all but credentialed journalists.

Case law offers mixed lessons for media access to government meetings, according to Nelson. “The courts draw a line between video- and audio-taping” — a line that she guessed may date to days when video equipment filled a room instead of a iPhones and BlackBerries.

The organization has taken a position on a conflict in St. Louis County, where county commissioners object to videotaping by a watchdog group. In a Feb. 10 letter to the county board (pdf), Nelson wrote:

The [Minnesota Open Meeting Law (OML)] protects access to government meetings for both the general public and the news media. … Implicit in the public’s right to attend government meetings is the right to record those meetings.

In the case of the county board, no official recording is made of its workshop meetings. It’s different at the state Capitol, where the Legislature offers its own video feed.

“If official recordings [are provided] then interests [of those seeking the right to record] are less,” Nelson said. However, the official Capitol feed provides video from only one legislative venue at a time, as reporters reminded a House staffer who called a clear-the-air meeting with media Monday.

The “forum doctrine” recognized by courts interpreting the federal Constitution’s First Amendment defines public forums as spaces like public parks. Under the doctrine, rooms where elected officials make decisions are non-public forums, where greater limits are allowed.

(While the First Amendment says Congress can’t restrict free speech, the Minnesota Constitution specifically guarantees free speech rights to citizens.)

But restrictions at government meeting places must be neutral as to the identity and content, Nelson said. That means, for example, that partisan trackers should have the same rights as citizens and journalists to wield HandyCams at House hearings.

“It’s one thing to have the Legislature preserve decorum inside a hearing room, making sure there are not disruptions and allocating space in an evenhanded way,” Nelson said. Rules that apply only to one kind of media, on the other hand, seem to represent “another way for restricting how material is going to be used.”