Lawmakers attempt to deny access to working journalist

MYRL THOMPSON/Juneau Report

May 4, 2007

Editor's note: The following is excerpted from the weekly Juneau Report of Capitol watchdog Myrl Thompson.

If you didn't see Channel 2's April 27 report on me finally getting my press credentials, here is the skinny:

House Rules Committee chair John Coghill at first balked at the thought of me getting a press pass. One out-of-town reporter received his in a matter of hours, while I continued to wait. Mine took days.

The reasons stated may have been much different than the actual reasons for the delay, but that is politics, I suppose.

Actually, Coghill's office at first wanted me to sign some kind of journalistic ethics agreement. Hell, I've wanted the legislators to do that for years. (They still haven't.)

He backed off that idea after being contacted by Frontiersman Managing Editor Mark Kelsey and numerous other journalists who had never been offered the same &#8220opportunity.” I kept a copy of the ethics agreement, though, and read it every night before I go to bed.

After that, it was explained that I fell in a gray area of journalism because I write opinion pieces. That argument fell apart when it was pointed out that many prior and current editorial writers have been awarded press credentials here in Juneau.

There was one difference, though, because I was the only one named Myrl.

In the Channel 2 news story, Coghill indicated that when I first came down here to Juneau, which was four years ago now, that I focused on Big Lake Rep. Mark Neuman.

&#8220If somebody here is just writing about one particular individual - which Myrl started off doing - it would look more like a vendetta,” Coghill said. &#8220But then he broadened out.”

Well, you should know that I just had to go back and look at the nearly 40 published pieces, 38 Juneau Reports and roughly 90,000 words I have written to see if the statement was an accurate assessment of my work. From the looks of things, I've been Coghill'd.

The first year that I was down here, I only wrote about two legislators - Scott Ogan and Vic Kohring. Neuman was unemployed and living in Big Lake at that time.

Since then, and over the next three full legislative sessions, I have written specifically about Neuman only about six times, and they were spread out over the entire span.

Neuman and Sen. Charlie Huggins are my elected representatives in Juneau, but I have not singled them out at all. I've written about Huggins a bit more than Neuman, actually. I've even written about Fairbanks Rep. Jay Ramras far more than about Neuman.

In fact, I am an equal opportunity skewerer and have done a fair job of spreading my &#8220love” around to all the deserving. A number of my most favorite subjects are no longer around. They include Ogan, Sens. Ben Stevens and Ralph Seekins, Rep. Norm Rokeberg, former Attorney General Gregg Renkes and former Gov. Frank Murkowski.

So Coghill is safe from worries that I have singled out Neuman for anything. And it's not true that I've come down on any particular individual, period. As Harry Truman once said, &#8220I never did give anybody hell. I just told the truth and they thought it was hell.”

Valley resident Myrl Thompson is an award-winning free-lance journalist and former independent candidate for state House in District 15. He writes a twice-monthly &#8220Capitol Watch” column for the Frontiersman.