Lobbyist spending tops $3.5 million State election expenses only $2.6 million

AUGUSTA – A new study by the Washington-based Center For Public Integrity indicates more was spent to lobby members of the Legislature in 2000 than was spent on election campaigns by all the candidates who ran for the state House and Senate combined.

“I am somewhat surprised at that,” said Bates College political science professor Douglas Hodgkin. The study found that a little more than $3.5 million was spent to influence lawmakers. “That is a lot of money for a state the size of Maine.”

Campaign finance reports show less than $2.6 million was spent by all the candidates seeking one of the 35 Senate or 151 House seats in the Legislature.

The study, compiled in a book titled “Capitol Offenders,” looks at lobbying expenditures in the 23 states that compile total expenditures and salaries of lobbyists. Several states require only partial reports and 14 states don’t calculate totals at all.

“Like swarming locusts, tens of thousands of lobbyists vastly outnumber and overwhelm our elected state officials, 80 percent of whom are part-time with little or no staff,” said Charles Lewis, executive director of the Center in releasing the study which found that more than $570 million was spent in 2000 in the 34 states with full or partial reporting.

“As in Washington, state lobbyists are instrumental in raising campaign cash for their favorite lawmakers, of course,” Lewis said, “which amounted to no less than $1 billion in state legislative races in 2000, according to the National Institute on Money in State Politics.”

Diane Renzulli, a staff member at the Center, was the principal author of the book. She said that with many large states such as Florida, Illinois and Ohio, not reporting lobbyist compensation, the total being spent on lobbying across the country is much higher than the study could document.

“In California, the nation’s most populous state, some $180 million was spent,” she said. “There were nearly 37,000 interests registered across the country to lobby, or almost five interests per lawmaker.”

In Maine, 215 different groups, organizations and special interests were registered to lobby the Legislature in 2000. The numbers showed about two individual lobbyists for every one of the 186 lawmakers. Though Maine ranked only 47th among states in the nation for the number of interests registered and employing lobbyists, the state ranked 21st in the country for the amount spent by lobbyists.

“While they spent a lot of money, I am not sure how successful they were,” said Amy Fried, a political science professor at the University of Maine. “There were a lot of lobbyists on the prescription drug legislation and they spent a lot of money lobbying that issue, but they were not successful. The bill passed.”

In fact, it was not the pharmaceutical interests with the big numbers, but the insurance industry that ranked No. 1 in Maine with 23 different companies or organizations hiring lobbyists to fight for their causes.

The pharmaceutical industry ranked 6th, behind insurance, health services, forest products, health professionals and single issue categories. Compared to the rest of the nation, Maine ranked in the 40s for the number of lobbying groups working for each industry except forest products. In the forest products industry, Maine ranked fifth in the nation with ten companies or organizations employing lobbyists.

“It was, I think, 15 years ago when I did a survey of legislators on the most effective lobbying groups,” Hodgkin said, “and the top three were forest products, environmental groups and education. So, I am not surprised at the ranking for forest products.”

He said while disclosure of lobbying expenditures is very important, his past survey and this study point out that spending a lot of money does not always make lobbyists successful.

“I think if you asked today those three would still be among the most effective,” he said, “because effectiveness is more than money.”

Fried agreed. She said the Center study is an important one but she would like to see a study that looks at how effective all those lobbying efforts are.

“I am sure there are successes,” she said, “but in small states like Maine, I think there are also failures like the prescription drug battle.”

The Center is developing a data base that may allow that sort of study in the future, at least in those states that require disclosure of information on lobbying, campaign finance and office holder disclosure of personal finances.

Lewis said part of the effort in gathering information for the study involved collecting the financial disclosure forms of lawmakers in those states that require disclosure.

“Looking at lobbying and conflicts will become even more important as we see more policies determined at the state level,” Fried said.