By Laurel Rosenhall
lrosenhall@sacbee.com
Among the more than 1,200 lobbyists who do business in the state Capitol are a few dozen who know the lawmaking process from the inside: former legislators who now earn a living trying to influence their former colleagues.
State law prevents lawmakers from lobbying the Legislature within a year of leaving office. But even with that “cooling off” period, lawmakers-turned-lobbyists enjoy relationships with legislators that most other advocates will never develop.
“It’s a relational world in politics, as it is in most of life,” said Rick Keene, a lobbyist who represented the Chico area in the state Assembly from 2002 to 2008.
“People call me up because they know I’ve been in government before and they think, ‘Hey, maybe you can help us get this problem solved.’ ”
That leg-up draws private grumbling from those in the lobby corps who never served in the Senate or Assembly. There’s even more resentment of lawmakers who become “consultants” rather than lobbyists, a status that limits their contact with lawmakers but relieves them of disclosure requirements.
One day in the Capitol last week, Keene – a registered lobbyist – held a closed-door meeting with a client in the health care industry and Assemblyman Dan Logue, R-Linda. (****Keene selected Logue to succeed him when he left the assembly**** inserted in this story by Jack Lee as a point of information. )
Upstairs, on the fourth floor, lobbyist Bev Hansen worked the hallway outside a hearing room where several bills she was monitoring were up for discussion. Hansen, who represented the Sonoma area in the Assembly from 1986 to 1992, is now a partner at Lang Hansen O’Malley Miller – one of Sacramento’s highest-earning lobby firms.
Read more: http://www.sacbee.com/2011/08/22/3852514/california-lawmakers-turned-lobbyists.html#ixzz1VmWEoywT
This just in …
Given previous discussions on Islam and Sharia in this forum I thought the appearance of a Lybian Draft Constitution on the internet poignant.
Part 1, Article 1: Islam is the Religion of the State, and the principal source of legislation is Islamic Jurisprudence.
Islamic Jurisprudence is, of course, Sharia. If you do not understand Sharia, you do not understand Islam, Islamic nations, and Islam as it has spread into Europe, Indonesia, and the rest of the world.
Jack,
You should make a note when you’re adding your own opinion to a newsstory you’re quoting. The Sac Bee never used the phrase “Keene selected Logue.”
That’s a poor choice of words anyway. Logue made his own decision to run, as did others. Keene endorsed Logue for office and there’s nothing unusual about that. Doug LaMalfa likewise endorsed Jim Nielsen who replaced him. There was no “selection” and you know it.
I don’t want to stretch here Jack, and your comment wasn’t overboard or anything, but was a bit uncalled for.
As for the article, I don’t necessarily agree with the Bee on this one. Politics is the world’s second oldest profession and it’s done everywhere, at every level. Lobbyists develop an ability to lobby politicians but they’re not inherently evil. There are conservative lobbyists just as there are liberal lobbyists. I’m glad there are some fighting for my side, as you will never truly eliminate the practice.
Lobbying is a First Amendment freedom. Educating Legislators on the effect of the Bill they are voting on is a vital part of the process. On most issues there are lobbyists for both sides. An open minded Legislator can get the pros and cons from more that one point of view. There is no educational requirement for Legislators other than being able to raise the money to win a campaign. They are writing laws but seldom start out as experts in the issues. By the end of their terms some have developed great expertise. In practice, contrary to popular opinion, the Legislature runs on trust. They can be trusted as a good source of information.
Rick Keene is the best source of knowledge on local and state government that I know. He paid his dues in personal sacrifice and years of public abuse on the City Council. I think that it is great that his new career is flourishing. Why the bold print?
There are lobbyists that are also campaign consultants. That’s unethical and should be illegal. There is a huge difference between steering campaign contributions to incumbents for their consultants to spend and being the person they depend on for reelection.
Steve, thanks for the tip and I will go back and make that change. I thought it would be clear if I used parentheses between the lines to set my comments apart from the story, I have done that with other similar stories. But, you’re right, I should make it clear.
However, on the other comment I respectfully must differ. It is a fact that former Assemblyman Rick Keene did go in search of a candidate to replace himself. His search began at least 2 1/2 – 3 years before the Senate election when he ran.
So from most folks perspectives Mr. Keene did select Mr. Logue and he (Logue) had to pass Mr. Keene’s vetting process during the process. That much has already been admitted and its neither a bad thing or a good thing – it just is the history.
Actually, I was being generous when I made my brief notation, because what I wanted to say and I didn’t, was that thanks to this election-connection, Lobbyist Keene now has a direct line to Assemblyman Logue, or so it would appear. That’s not good. This is one of the those either real or perceptual things that causes voters to lose faith and become cynical that its all a big fix.
It’s a clear conflict of interest when an Assemblyman’s former election sponsor comes to him as a lobbyist for a closed door session. I don’t think anyone out here could see it otherwise, uh, well, does anyone out here see it otherwise?
In my humble opinion that “conflict of interest” should be reformed. One year is not enough time to keep former members of the Assembly from using their connections as lobbyists. It gives them a special advantage and that presents a potential for wrong doing. And so it is that Lobbyist Keene has the potential to assert an undue influence on at least one Assemblyman. He also has a great advantage over others seeking Assemblyman Logue’s ear – I think that much is clear as evidence by events in the story. Well…that was the whole point of the story wasn’t it?
Sadly, it’s also a great disservice to Assemblyman Logue to have that undue influence “perception” out here because it may not be deserved. If he is his own man then Mr. Keene’s lobbying efforts may have no effect other than to provide him with good counsel. I have no objection that. However, now if Assemblyman comes up with something to “help” the healthcare industry that Mr. Keene also wanted for them (his clients)… then the measure is tainted. At the very least it will look like payback and that’s a problem. Surely, we can agree on this part?
Steve, I sincerely hope we can agree on this because reforming this area is so important to me and I really want to do whatever we can to regain the voters trust and ultimately having clean, clear, elections and government or a much as may be humanly possible. I know we will never have it perfect – its always a work in progress. For your efforts in this regard you have my thanks. You’ve been a real diligent worker for the cause.
FYI: Good government is my only agenda here and if the story had been about any other two people I would have reached the same conclusion. It is what it is.
Pypr: Good comments and I appreciate you standing up for what is right. You nailed it when you said that, lobbyist should not be involved in political campaigns, it should be illegal.
As we all know, lobbyists are considered to be the third house in Sacramento. Many would call them an essential arm of government, their clients certainly consider them essential! And thus they are generally very well paid for their services, i.e. to lobby, but not to elect. So again, great comment!
We all should realize that lobbyists have the potential to do great things and they often write the legislation that eventually gets passed – conversely they have the potential to do really bad things because of the same activity. It all depends on the circumstances. So in fairness I say they should not be presumed to be either saintly or evil, they are what they are – lobbying for a cause or entity. They are an informed source and often have many connections to grease the wheels.
Your endorsement for Rick Keene is duly noted and I’m sure it is appreciated by him and his many supporters. But, staying on track, the perception of influence peddling or a serious conflict of interest exists whenever a lobbyist (any lobbyist) gets one of those long, closed door sessions with one of our elected officials.
Maybe when the visits are more frequent and the connections to said elected official are very direct and or personal, then this perception should be even greater and as good citizens we should be aware of such things. An informed voter is a smarter voter.
another point of interest….Rick Keene lost his bid for senate seat big time to Lamalfa is this comment ok?
Frank you go right ahead and say what you need to say – this is a free speech forum.
I didn’t see the story as being negative at all. Politics is relationship based. How else could the system function? I don’t see befitting from political relationships built over years as wrong once you are no longer in office. If you can help clients get through the maze of government regulations or stop some stupid oversight in a Bill that will put them out of business, that has value. People don’t earn their living by using their acquired knowledge alone. I suspect that leadership on Wall Street and Major Corporations is built on relationships developed at Ivy League schools, more so than merit. That just the way it works. At least in politics, theoretically, outsiders that work hard, have a shot.
Jack,
Cleaning up government is a cause we can agree on. It’s unfortunate that the Sac Bee, when and if they do stories on government, tend to focus only on republicans and in this case our republicans. There’s plenty of abuse by democrats in Sacramento, which they control, but they are rarely the headline story. The bee does the same thing on budgeting. They’ll highlight a republican with a large district who spends $10k of their $600k budget on travel while ignoring a democrat with a small district but a total budget 5 times that ($2 to 3 million) of the republican. This story was more of the same.
It seems you and I still have our disagreements on the history of Logue and Keene. Suffice to say I’ve worked with Logue for 3 years now and the man is beholden to no one but his constituents, one of which is now Keene. Looking at our entire Legislature I can think of few who work as hard for the conservative cause as Dan Logue does now, and I’m not afraid to defend him.
Doug LaMalfa is also working for the conservative cause (I like his fight against high-cost rail) and I would defend him if someone tried to say he shouldn’t meet with influential people to further our goals as well. I would also expect that when Doug is ready to leave the Senate he will try to recruit someone he likes to run for the office. There’s nothing out of the ordinary with that.
Steve, as you know this forum covers many things, but politics is always at the forefront. There’s no subject that will drawn more fire than politics!!! So, I appreciate it when people step forward and give their heartfelt opinion, even if they regularly take me to task (Libby-Chris, Q, lol).
We can take some solace in knowing nobody will ever agree 100% on anything! Not our wives, not our children and certainly not our fellow voters! The best we can hope for is to express ourselves, be honest and forthright, and if our cause is right and we’re lucky, maybe… we will gain a consensus along the way and make a positive change.
Its why we’re here; you, me, Tina and all our readers and posters – we’re all in this together, to do what we see as right….so, if we disagree on occasion, that’s just the price of admission to this very decent group of patriots. You just hang in there and feel free to disagree… any time.