Georgia House Speaker Glenn Richardson’s ticket to a suite at Chicago’s Wrigley Field cost $233. Food and drinks while watching the Cubs lose 3-0, $119. Two tickets for the previous day’s game, $336.
Richardson, however, paid nothing. Lobbyists for Georgia Power, a tobacco company and a pharmaceutical firm picked up the tabs — part of the $50,696 in meals, drinks, tickets, air fare and other gratuities that Richardson accepted from lobbyists since becoming speaker in January 2005. Only two lawmakers received more.
Richardson’s spectacular fall from power, culminating Thursday in his resignation from the speaker’s post and his House seat, highlights anew the culture of coziness between lobbyists and lawmakers in the Georgia Capitol. That culture is fueled by money, access to power and, some say, influence peddling that favors the lobbyists with the most generous expense accounts.
It has benefited not just Richardson, but other top lawmakers — including his replacement as speaker, Rep. Mark Burkhalter, and the House majority leader, Rep. Jerry Keen.
“The concern the public has is that lobbyists have unlimited use of their funds to get support from legislators,” state Rep. Wendell Willard (R-Atlanta) said Thursday, shortly after Richardson announced his resignation in a conference call with House members. Expensive trips, tickets and meals, Willard said, “go beyond what the public sees as being appropriate.”
Lobbyists have spent almost $1.3 million entertaining legislators and other officials so far this year, according to reports filed with the State Ethics Commission. But lawmakers routinely deny that such largesse buys their votes.
Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, for instance, has received gifts valued at $12,870 since 2005, records show. But Jaillene Hunter, Cagle’s spokeswoman, said, “It absolutely does not influence the lieutenant governor’s decision-making process.”
In Richardson’s case, it was a romantic relationship with a lobbyist — revealed by his former wife in a television interview that aired Monday — that proved to be his undoing. Susan Richardson told Atlanta television station WAGA that her former husband engaged in a “full-out affair” with a lobbyist while sponsoring legislation that favored the woman’s employer, Atlanta Gas Light Co.
The speaker, whose resignation takes effect Jan. 1, has not addressed his former wife’s allegations.
Richardson (R-Hiram) regularly kept company with lobbyists since becoming the first Republican since Reconstruction to lead the House.
Lobbyists have paid Richardson’s way to Washington, New Orleans and the Georgia coast. They’ve taken him hunting on a South Georgia plantation. They’ve given him tickets to the Daytona 500, the Atlanta Falcons, the Radio City Rockettes and the Rolling Stones. In February 2008, four days after he and his wife filed for divorce, Richardson accepted two tickets valued at $562 for a Van Halen concert.
Disclosure reports list 795 separate gifts to Richardson during the past five years. The biggest givers were the Georgia Automobile Dealers Association; the Georgia Beer Wholesalers; the lobbying firm Georgia Public Strategies, which represents Philip Morris USA; the Georgia Alliance of Community Hospitals; and a title pawn lender, among others.
Burkhalter (R-Johns Creek), the speaker pro tem, has received even more — $52,076.
Georgia Power, for instance, has spent $7,120 entertaining Burkhalter since 2005, records show. The community hospitals group spent $3,076. AGL, which pushed the controversial pipeline bill that connected Richardson and the lobbyist with whom he allegedly had an affair, spent $1,833 on Burkhalter, the measure’s lead sponsor.
Keen (R-St. Simons Island), the third-ranking House leader, received $49,103 since 2005, much of it from the same sources.
Senate leaders got less: Eric Johnson (R-Savannah), who was president pro tem, accepted $18,688 in entertainment and other gifts, while his replacement, Tommie Williams (R-Lyons), took $23,560.
By contrast, the House minority leader, Rep. DuBose Porter (D-Dublin), accepted $5,945 during the past five years. His Senate counterpart, Robert Brown (D-Macon), took $2,243.
Porter, a candidate for governor in 2010, said lobbyists have focused their efforts on a handful of House leaders since Richardson instituted a system that let him send his lieutenants to vote in any committee considering a contentious bill.
“The top controlled it all,” Porter said. “The influence peddling only had to be at the top because they controlled it all.”
Willard, the Atlanta Republican, plans to introduce legislation to cap lobbyist gifts at $100.
Bill Bozarth, executive director of the public interest group Common Cause of Georgia, said such a limit would restore integrity to the Legislature, which now seems to be a “big club ... where these people are intertwined with each other.”
The circumstances leading to Richardson’s resignation, he said, emphasize “the degree that lobbyists are in bed, literally or figuratively, with legislators.”
Some socializing between lobbyists and lawmakers may be appropriate, Bozarth said, but gifts such as tickets to luxury boxes and travel have become excessive.
“If they don’t see anything compromising in that,” he said, “what world are they living in?”
Source: ajc.com/
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