I recently returned from a mission to collect political ad files from TV stations in Miami. These files document who's buying political ads — and how much they're paying to influence your vote.

At the station housing both CBS4 and MyTV33, I ran into a few logistical problems, due primarily to over-the-top security.

A staffer led me to her office, where the political files were kept under lock and key in big file cabinets that lined the walls. Inside the cabinets were not the traditional hanging files most stations use, but piles of three-ring binders. The only other time I ran into three-ring binders was at Chicago’s ABC station.

I was worried. You see, three-ring binders are a sign. It means the person who manages the files takes the job very seriously and has an intricate organizational system in place. When this is the case, it usually means they want you to touch the files as little as possible for fear of ruining their system.

Such was the case here. The staffer took out the book and handed it to me with a stack of sticky notes. “Go ahead and put a sticky note on any page you want photocopied,” she said. I explained that I had brought a scanner and planned to copy all of the stations’ files. She didn’t believe me.

Once I convinced her I was serious, she began looking for an open desk for me. After about 20 minutes, she returned and said she couldn’t find a place for me to sit, and she couldn’t let the binders leave her office. I ended up using a couch and small side table in her office while she worked at her desk.

The CBS4 and MyTV33 files consisted of info on the usual suspects — the same groups that advertised at other Florida stations I visited. What I found interesting was not so much who was advertising as how much they were advertising.

Most of the groups had made between one and five modest ad buys. Their files were usually in the realm of 20–40 pages. But the pro-Romney American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS had racked up almost 600 pages in the political ad files of the two stations. While the two Crossroads groups are always big spenders, no other station in Miami or Chicago that I visited had this kind of ad buy from these groups.

It took me from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. to scan all the files, and the staffer got a firsthand look at my process. Each file was bound in a three-ring binder, stapled and then paper-clipped into groups in a particular order.

As I began dismantling each packet, I had to keep track of where the staples went, where the paper clips belonged and what order the pages went in. On top of this, all of the various fastening devices left a series of scrapes, tears and holes in the pages, which wreaked havoc on the scanner’s paper feeder. The three-hole punches were particularly tough to deal with — it was like my very own Florida hanging-chad nightmare — and meant I was fixing paper jams almost every 20 pages.

As the CBS staffer walked me out at the end of the day, she said, “It sure will be nice when all of this is online, huh?”

Yes. Yes indeed.

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