Lobbying City and County Attorneys

There is a front-page article in the New York Times today about the recent increase in lobbying and entertaining state attorneys general (AGs), as well as in campaign contributions from businesses who have a financial interest in decisions that these AGs make, especially with respect to suits they file on behalf of consumers.

Since many state lobbying laws only requiring disclosure of lobbying directed to legislators, much of this lobbying is done in secret and the campaign contributions are permitted. Many contributions are made through partisan AG associations, which were formed in 2000 and 2002, and are funded by big companies that stand to benefit from AG decisions.

In addition, revolving door laws sometimes do not apply to AGs — or former AGs insist they are acting as lawyers and are, therefore, excepted from revolving door laws that apply only to lobbyists — enabling them to immediately do work for companies that are seeking special benefits from the office they just left, as well as their former "clients" in government agencies and the legislature.

The question is, are city and county attorneys being lobbied in the same way by interested parties? These attorneys — most of whom are not elected, but rather are appointed by mayors, councils, and/or managers — not only are responsible for government litigation, but are also highly influential with respect to legislation (which they usually draft) and every other local government matter, upon which they offer their legal and often policy opinions. Especially when there is no strong mayor, the city or county attorney is often the single most influential individual, even if she never gets to vote on legislation.

I know that if I were a local lobbyist, the city or county attorney would be high on my list of officials to lobby. If I could do it in secret, all the better for my client (or if I were the principal, for myself).

City and county attorneys are sometimes not included in local lobbying laws, or they feel they are excepted from this form of transparency due to the confidentiality of their work. So communications with them are not disclosed and, therefore, no one knows how much they are being lobbied. Since they do not vote, there is also no public occasion for them to disclose relationships with lobbyists and principals that might affect their participation in government matters. Communications with city and county attorneys that go beyond procedural matters, discovery, and settlement talks should be considered lobbying, and should therefore be disclosed. It doesn't matter if the individual communicating is a lawyer or not, as long as what he or she is doing involves lobbying activities.

Lobbyists and their principals cannot directly make campaign contributions to city and county attorneys, except for the few who are elected officials. But they can allow a city or county attorney to bundle their contributions. This allows city and county attorneys to get more influence over elected officials. In addition, these attorneys can use contribution bundling to make lobbyists and their principals pay in order to get special access to them and make use of the attorneys' special access to and influence over officials. For this reason, city and county attorneys should not be permitted to bundle campaign contributions, directly or indirectly.

Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics

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