IT MIGHT HAVE ENDED long ago, but somehow the Legislative Follies hung on to be affirmatively killed this year. A spoof of the lawmaking process -- and lawmakers, high and low -- the end-of-session romp was a welcome interlude for many of its participants and viewers. It will not be held this year, for the first time in 20 years.

The Follies were strictly inside politics -- fully fathomable only to participants and their audience of several hundred gathered in the St. John's College auditorium.

Some memorable skits from Follies gone by: former Gov. Harry R. Hughes flipping through a slide show and observing that the pictures were obviously not official because none of them included former Sen. Frank Shore, who had an uncanny ability to show up in official photographs.

Hughes continued through the pictures, coming to one showing him and former House of Delegates Speaker Benjamin L. Cardin, neither man known for his star quality. "Here's Ben giving me charisma lessons," Hughes said.

Sometimes the lines were funny and prescient (though not too risky). Among the better lines at last year's Follies was from Del. Kumar P. Barve, the Montgomery County Democrat and a force behind the Assembly's spoof.

Carried majestically to the front of the stage on a makeshift sedan chair, Barve launched into a sendup of Johnny Carson's "Karnack." Holding an envelope to his turbaned head, Barve gave answers and then requested the question from his retainers.

"Point 08," said the magnificent Democrat. "And the question is?"

"The percentage of the vote Ray Schoenke will get in this year's Democratic gubernatorial primary," came the reply.

The event had its low points, which need no review here.

Some are apt to say the Follies died at the hands of reformers who made it difficult to raise whatever money was needed for the productions. Anything legislators do these days -- particularly where money is involved -- faces close scrutiny.

Others think the production and the players were simply played out -- tired and unwilling to devote the time.

Glendening news conference? Few and far between

Not since June 1995 has Gov. Parris N. Glendening held a full-fledged news conference, having decided he has no need of that once-common vehicle for presenting gubernatorial views.

"We just don't think a format where he comes out and takes a bunch of questions is the best use of someone's time," said his press secretary, Ray Feldmann. "It may not be the best forum for this governor. When he talks about an issue, he likes to get out and do it in the community."

The closest thing to a full-bore, give-and-take conference, he said, are events held in the State House's reception room where the governor makes an announcement or appointment and then takes questions. Ten of these have been held this year, but none of them has been billed as a news conference, Feldmann said.

In the past year, Glendening has held 33 of these sessions, not including events outside the building. That number would be larger but for last year's gubernatorial campaign.

Unlike his predecessors, Glendening seldom if ever feels the need to unburden himself about some issue or to clarify something he's said or done, according to Feldmann.

"It's not an issue of accessibility. Reporters get a list of public events on his weekly schedule. They can go and ask him anything about any topic," he said.

Beyond that, he said, "reporters call daily and want to talk to him firsthand about something, and we arrange an in-person or telephone conversation."

The theory behind these events, if there is any, might be that reporters asking questions en masse of a state's chief policy maker can find and elucidate more comprehensively and probingly any issue of public interest.

Under the current setup, Feldmann said, reporters have sometimes had no questions at all. From one point of view, that may be an ideal result. Probably not from the public's, however.

Road projects revived -- but on a smaller scale

Glendening caved on the Brookeville bypass last week, conceding that something needed to be done to protect the historic village in northern Montgomery County.

Will Montgomery's Intercounty Connector, or ICC, be next?

House Speaker Casper R. Taylor Jr. thinks the answer is yes. At a breakfast meeting in Baltimore last week, Taylor referred to it as "the ICC, or whatever it's going to be called."

When he all but pulled the plug on the ICC last year, Glendening said he wanted to see if there weren't alternatives to the plans he'd supported for 15 years. He appointed a task force to study it -- and allowed his transportation department to continue buying rights of way.

Taylor and others are arguing that Glendening's new emphasis on economic development must proceed in tandem with transportation and highways. The speaker was suggesting that some version of an ICC is essential and likely.

In an unofficial measure of its direction, Glendening's Transportation Solutions Group voted 8-4 recently in support of an east-west Montgomery County toll road.

The panel's approach would bring a scaled-down version of the ICC superhighway that was once planned -- just as the new version of the Brookeville bypass is smaller. Supporters of both are no doubt encouraged that these roadways, whatever their names, are live prospects.

Pub Date: 3/09/99