By Jennifer Perkins
Picture if you will, Jane Q. Public wants to get some information on how the legislature in Virginia operates. Particularly, she is interested in the committees: names of the committees, names of their members, what their jurisdiction is, what kind of timelines the General Assembly has on bill introduction and passage, maybe a chart on executive branch and legislative branch functions and basically general structural and procedural information on the esteemed General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
Now imagine, if you can, that Jane Q. Public does not have Internet access, or has only dial-up access (yes, those people do exist!), so she decides one day while visiting Richmond to stop by the offices of the Capitol and see what kind of booklets, pamphlets, handouts, they have to educate the public on the process.
After walking once all around the Capitol Building in 95-degree heat and there being no obvious public entrance to the Capitol, Jane sees a sign that says “General Assembly Offices” and thinks maybe the information she needs might be with the staff of the General Assembly. Being post-9/11 there is of course a security check to enter the building, with a very official looking guard politely inquiring as to your business in the building. Jane empties her pockets, removes her sunglasses, puts her bags on the X-ray, then signs her name, the date and the time of her visit into the visitors book and is given a sticky paper badge that says “visitor.” The helpful security guard tells her to go to the second floor to Legislative Services where they should be able to help her.
Upon arriving at the second floor desk, the nice woman behind the counter says no, they don’t have any information like the kind Jane is looking for, but she makes a phone call and then tells Jane to go back to the Capitol to the third floor to the “Legislative Information Office.”
Jane troops back down the stairs, out the door, and back out into the scathing July sun. She has been told to go to the Bank Street entrance where she troops up dozens of stairs to the doors on the south side of the Capitol. Feeling faint from the heat and winded from the walk she tries the door and it is locked, so are all the other doors. She looks around in disbelief, then peering down the hill sees a mound resembling a bunker and wonders, could that be it? Could that be the public entrance? Back down the stairs, her feet are starting to hurt in her heels, and yes! There is a door! And it’s for visitors!
Mercifully out of the heat and into the blissful brand new air conditioned visitor center, she approaches the two women at the big desk. One is on the phone so Jane tells the other that she has been told to go to the Legislative Information Office on the third floor. The women tells her she doesn’t know anything about that and that Jane will have to talk to the woman on the phone. When the phone-woman hangs up and Jane tells her that she is looking for information on the structure and procedure of the Virginia General Assembly, the phone-woman says they don’t have anything like that and that generally the public is not allowed to go to the third floor of the Capitol. The woman says another man was in earlier that day asking for the same information. Jane is persistent. Could she go to the third floor and see this magical Legislative Information Office? The woman makes a call. She tells Jane to go through security and go to the third floor.
Jane, feet aching by now, walks up a series of no fewer than five sets of ramps and stairs to reach the first floor of the Capitol and takes an elevator to the third floor. There is no sign that says “Legislative Information,” but there is another nice woman behind a big round desk. Jane remembers that the woman downstairs said to ask for “Patty.”
“Is there a Patty here?” Jane asks the nice woman behind the big round desk. You want the Clerk’s Office for the House of Delegates, the woman says.
Jane wonders to herself why she’s being sent to the Clerk’s Office instead of Legislative Information, but back into the elevator she goes.
Once in the Clerk’s Office, Jane asks for “Patty,” who happens to be filling in for the person who normally sits at that desk but is away at a conference. She is unaware of any pamphlets, charts, booklets, books or other publications on structure and procedure but asks if Jane has seen the legislative Web site? Jane explains that she lives in a very small town without good Internet access. Still, Patty asks if Jane lives in Richmond because the people who can help Jane will be back next week. Jane lives 90 miles away.
Patty says that maybe the publications office can help. She looks at a sheet and finds the phone number.
“Oh,” she says, “It’s called information services, not publications.”
She gives Jane the direct line of the person in charge at the information office. He is also at a conference but will be back next week. She also gives Patty the card of the woman for whom she is filling in. Jane thanks the well-meaning Patty and goes back down to the lobby.
Back outside, trudging up the hill in the oppressive July heat, a Capitol Police officer rides by on his official Capitol bike and says, “Hey, I think you’re getting more exercise than me today!”
When Jane gets back to her car, her meter has expired and she has a ticket for parking overtime (there’s no free public parking near the General Assembly.) And so after an hour-and-a-half, in and out of security, up and down stairs, and a good amount of time in the hot July sun, Jane doesn’t have any information, but she has two phone numbers of people who might be able to help her in her quest and a parking ticket.
The following week Jane called the first contact name she was given and was told she would need to contact the second contact.
Then she gave up.