Baldacci to solicit ideas via Internet

AUGUSTA – When Gov.-elect John Baldacci takes office next month, he will become a dot-com governor.

That’s because one of the first things Baldacci will do once he takes office Jan. 8 is ask Mainers to offer ideas over the Internet on how to balance the state budget. Baldacci said he got the idea – which is unusual if not unprecedented – after Gov. Angus King invited Mainers to vote online for one of four designs for the Maine state quarter.

“Not only would we like you to help with the design of the quarter,” Baldacci said, “but we’d like your help to save a few” quarters as well.

Baldacci’s official gubernatorial Web site should be operational Jan. 8, but the link for public comment on the budget may not be up and running until later in the month, according to Lee Umphrey, Baldacci’s spokesman.

Umphrey said Baldacci’s call for budget-balancing suggestions “is going to symbolize how accessible the administration will be,” in part by using the Internet to create what Umphrey called “an electronic town hall.”

The fact that Mainers will be able to communicate with their governor by e-mail is nothing new; King’s Web site includes a link for people who want to contact the governor.

What is new is the use of the Internet to solicit public comment on a particular public-policy issue, such as the budget. The state faces a projected $1 billion shortfall in the two-year budget cycle that starts July 1, and Baldacci has said repeatedly that he wants to fill that hole without raising taxes.

Robert Klotz, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Southern Maine and an expert on the use of the Internet in politics, said Baldacci’s idea is noteworthy because it represents “a targeted effort to see if people want to provide input.”

He said Baldacci’s initiative also is commendable because it will be interactive with Maine residents.

“A lot of officeholders are trying to figure out ways to use the interactivity of the Internet,” Klotz said, and this is one way to do just that.

When King asked Mainers to give their opinions on what the official Maine quarter should look like, more than 117,000 ballots were cast – including 110,000 on the Internet. The U.S. Mint will issue the quarter next year.

At the least, Baldacci sees the Internet as a way to stay in touch with his constituents once he takes office.

He said one of the best ways to find out what’s on the public’s mind is to spend “an afternoon at a coffee shop or at a deli counter,” and this is simply a high-tech way of doing the same thing.