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For Immediate Release: April 8th, 2004 Contact: Contact: Jordan Isenstadt (c) 516.991.3842 (w) 212.490.9535 (f) 212.490.2151 ***PRESS
RELEASE*** State Senator Liz Krueger
Proposes Comprehensive Lobbying Reform Legislation Offers Motion to Petition
in Attempt to Pull Lobbying Bill out of Committee Albany,
NY – State Senator Liz Krueger (D-Manhattan) issued a call today for the State
Senate to take up lobbying reform legislation when they return from the
Passover/Easter recess next Wednesday.
On March 31st, Senator Krueger filed a motion to
petition on S. 5922, a bill which is aimed at increasing public confidence in
state and local government by taking steps to regulate the interactions
between lobbyists and government officials. A motion to petition allows a member of the Senate to petition
the Senate as a whole for a vote on legislation that is stalled in
committee. The petition lost, with
only 14 members (all Democrats) in support.
“The
public should have the opportunity to know when groups and individuals
attempt to go around the public process and influence decisions through
informal mechanisms,” said Senator Krueger. “This proposal is about promoting open, good government,
bolstering confidence in the practices employed by state and local
governments and contracting for goods and services. Taxpayers, including both the public and
the business community, have a right to know who is vying for government
contracts and how they are working to influence those decisions.” Senator Krueger’s lobbying reform legislation, S. 5922,
would amend the definition of lobbying to include, efforts to influence the
enactment or content of an executive order; efforts to influence the actions
of state agency officials regarding the procurement of goods and services;
efforts to influence the actions of any municipal officer regarding the
procurement of goods and services; and efforts to influence the
implementation of rules and regulations.
The bill would also raise the threshold of allowable expenditures and
compensation at which lobbyist registration is required from $2,000 to $7,000
annually, provide that the lobbying compensation threshold may be computed
separately for state and municipal lobbying efforts and require that
lobbyists must disclose in all activity title of any contracts, and the
identifying numbers of bids, or requests for bids or proposals that they have
expect to lobby on. “Let's face it,” stated Senator Krueger. “Lobbying
reform is desperately needed in the state of New York. Over $120 million was spent on lobbying in
this year alone. Public authorities have truly become the fourth
branch of government, as nine large state authorities contracted for nearly
$4 billion in the year 2002. Yet, our
lobbying laws do not require any serious reporting of this information for
the Legislature and the public to understand the process that is gone through
to award state contracts and money. This
lack of accountability and oversight all but invites corruption.” The majority of all procurement contracts entered into by
the New York State are subject to the rules of the competitive bidding
process. However, that does not
prevent individuals from attempting to influence agency or municipal
officials when seeking a favorable decision on a submitted bid. By including government procurement, and
executive orders in the lobbying law, and prohibiting contingency payments
for this type of lobbying, New York State would institute a strong protection
of integrity of the procurement process. “It is time for New York State to do what the majority of
other states have already done,” stated Senator Krueger. “We must institute a new rule of law so
that we have an accurate, fair and open process for documentation and
recording of lobbying fees. We should
know whom people are working for, whom their clients are, how much they are
getting paid and what assignment they have.
That is what we owe the public. We are spending their money,
and we are simply not accountable enough to them.” -30- |
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