Indiana lawmakers look for ethics exemptions

One of the cornerstones of the Indiana General Assembly’s 2010 ethics reform bill was a ban on lobbyist-funded, out-of-state travel for legislators.

As it turns out, the ban isn’t quite an iron-clad rule.

And two years after the bill’s passage, legislators are busy trying to carve out additional exemptions to the rules.

If lobbyists can’t directly pay for a state legislator to go on a junket, they have another option.

By simply paying for membership in a group like the American Legislative Exchange Council, which brings together corporate lobbyists and a host of conservative legislators at conferences around the country, the lobbyists get unfettered access to influential legislators.

ALEC, seen by critics as the driving force behind the effort to make Indiana the 23rd right-to-work state, was given a specific exemption to the lobbying law when it was passed, on the claim that the group is nonpartisan and doesn’t engage in lobbying activity.

But so were six other national groups, all claiming to be established for the education and support of legislators. The groups come from across the political spectrum: The National Conference of State Legislatures, the National Conference of Insurance Legislators, Women in Government, the Council of State Governments and the National Black Caucus of State Legislators.

Now a group of Indiana senators is trying to add to the list of exempt groups.

Senate Bill 244 proposes adding the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation, the National Assembly of Sportsmen’s Caucuses and the State Agriculture and Rural Leaders Association to the exemption list.

State Sen. Brent Steele, R-Bedford, and State Sen. John Waterman, R-Shelburn, are asking for the sportsmen’s groups to be exempted.

Giving the groups an exemption would allow legislators like Steele and Waterman to travel to the groups’ conferences and hunting trips, at the groups’ expense, without running afoul of the lobbying rules or having to disclose the trips.

State Sen. Jean Leising, R-Oldenburg, a co-author of the bill along with Steele and Waterman, is proposing to add the State Agriculture and Rural Leaders, a group funded by a who’s who of agribusiness concerns, to the exempted list.

“My concern is, are they really just trying to educate legislators, or are they a front groups for lobbyists?” said Julia Vaughn, executive director of Common Cause Indiana, a legislative watchdog group. “If we start exempting groups, based on the claim they’re educational groups and not advocates, where does it end?”

Working with ALEC

State Sen. Jim Buck, R-Kokomo, said he attended three ALEC conferences last year, in his role as chairman of the group’s national Tax & Fiscal Policy task force. He said ALEC covered some of his travel costs through “scholarships,” which are funded through a mix of member fees and corporate contributions.

Buck bristled when asked about allegations that corporate interests often write the model legislation ALEC members bring back to state assemblies, saying each proposal goes through a lengthy vetting process involving several committee votes. But ALEC also doesn’t shy away from claims that the group fosters “public/private partnerships” to arrive at legislative proposals.

“As legislators, we’re information poor, because we have hundreds of subjects to learn about, and we’re part-time,” Buck said. “We try to inform ourselves at the conferences, so when you do go home, you’re able to make an informed choice.”

Buck said the only difference between ALEC and the National Conference of State Legislatures, “is that ALEC isn’t supported by taxpayer dollars.”

In fact, state legislators are allowed to attend one educational conference each year, at taxpayer expense. Many attend NCSL conferences, while others choose to use their reimbursed travel to go to an ALEC conference.

Buck doesn’t like calling ALEC a conservative organization, saying the group is guided by “Jeffersonian principles of limited government.”

“If those values are conservative, then you can consider it a conservative group,” Buck said. “When you start putting labels you start to channel people into certain ways of thinking. I try not to label NCSL as liberal, but NCSL is usually more in favor of government intervention, so if you want to label it liberal, you can.”

Education only?

Leising said legislators had hoped a “catch-all clause” included in the original ethics reform bill would give legislators blanket permission to accept paid travel to any “national organization established for the education and support of legislative leadership, legislators, legislative staff, or related government employees.”

But Chuck Harris, executive director and general counsel of the Indiana Lobby Registration Commission, said the clause would have to be interpreted narrowly, meaning that only groups strictly involved with educational efforts would fall under the exemption.

So the senators backing SB 244, perhaps concerned that some of the three groups’ activities might venture beyond education into lobbyist-type advocacy, decided to seek a clear-cut exemption.

If the bill passes, the groups will all be exempt from the gift disclosures and paid travel bans imposed on lobbyists, regardless of whether lobbying occurs at their events.

Leising says the groups aren’t lobbyists, simply because “they don’t come [to the Legislature] and lobby.”

“I don’t see anyone from these groups here lobbying, and if they do come, it’s typically at the request of a legislator to come here and provide information,” she said.

Vaughn, however, said that distinction means little if legislators can travel out of state, paid for by undisclosed donors, and meet with lobbyists at conferences. “They’re closely engaged with organizations that do lobbying, so I’m concerned about a lack of transparency,” she said. “We don’t want to create gaps in the law where groups who do the same work as lobbyists are not required to disclose or register. It doesn’t give the public a clear picture on who’s influencing the General Assembly.”

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