TESTIMONY
Ben Weinberg of Citizens Union on Strengthening Regulations for Political Consulting and Fundraising Activities by Lobbyists in New York City
2:32:53
·
4 min
Weinberg expresses support for legislative measures aimed at enhancing disclosure and regulation of political consulting and fundraising activities by lobbyists in New York City.
- He highlights the persistent issue of dual service firms serving both political campaigns and lobbying city government
- Weinberg advocates for Intro 742, a bill to limit lobbying firms' ability to assist in electing candidates they later intend to lobby
- He recommends expanding the bill's scope to cover staff/appointees of elected officials and preventing lobbying firms from circumventing restrictions
- Weinberg supports improved transparency in lobbying disclosure reports and a ban on lobbyists bundling donations
- He backs expanding post-employment restrictions for city officials to align with state rules while cautioning about impacts on recruitment and retention
Ben Weinberg
2:32:53
I was happy to help, and now it's on me to thank you, a council member, Brewer, both for introducing these bills and for bringing us all together to discuss this important issue.
2:33:06
As once mentioned here, since 2007, lobbyists have been required to disclose information about their political consulting and and fundraising activities in their periodic reports.
2:33:19
Now that disclosure was a necessary first step, but we're we're 17 years later.
2:33:24
And that that hasn't really led to any reduction in the number of these kind of dual service firms that also that serve campaigns and lobby city government.
2:33:33
In fact, we our analysis as and as the executive director of the CFP mentioned, is an imprecise analysis because the numbers are imprecise.
2:33:41
But our analysis did found that of the top 50 companies that provide consulting and professional services provided in the 2021 election.
2:33:51
24 of 24% of them were So almost a quarter, right, of the kind of top camping consulting firms in that cycle were lobbyists.
2:34:00
And that's actually higher than had existed 10 years before.
2:34:03
Word in testimony includes some clear examples of those conflicts where where lobbying firms help candidates to win and then go on to lobby those same people in office.
2:34:12
So that's why we government support intro 742, which would limit the ability of of firms and individual to lobby can as they help get elected.
2:34:21
It was mentioned earlier that this might be an unconventional approach.
2:34:25
I should point out that San Francisco has a similar strictions.
2:34:28
They actually have a stricter 1 of 5 years.
2:34:31
A ban in places like Philadelphia, Alaska, and Maryland all have rules against the direct involvement of job is in campaign or fundraising for campaigns.
2:34:40
Some of them has been litigated.
2:34:44
We have 3 recommendations to strengthen this bill or should mention 2 here first.
2:34:49
It currently covers only elected officials that are former clients, and we think it should cover also staff members or appointees.
2:34:56
OF THOSE ELECTED OFFICIALS.
2:34:58
SO THIS IS ESPECIALLY IMPORTANT FOR MYORAL CANDETS AND Really MOST OF THE RECENT NEWS WE'VE SEEN AROUND THIS ARE ABOUT lobbying commissioners after you left the after you ran a mural campaign.
2:35:11
The other one is really to ensure that lobbying firms can't avoid this bill by either setting up a new division or a new LLC And and we have some proposed language in the bill on how to counter that.
2:35:29
Of of short of time, I will just mention that we also support better lobby better transparency on the lobbying disclosure of fund raising on political activities.
2:35:39
As chair wrestler mentioned, it is very difficult to access those that information.
2:35:44
Nor is information reported in the annual reports, it would be great to know things like, you know, see aggregated data of those disclosures How many fundraisers are are held by lobbies, top lobbying, foreign political consulting.
2:35:58
I'll wrap up.
2:36:00
I'll be remiss if I want mentioned that we also support another important way to close a play to play loophole in our lobbying laws.
2:36:09
And that is to ban lobbyists from bundling donations.
2:36:14
Lobbyists and people under doing business database are severely restricted in terms of the size of the country.
2:36:20
Tribition, they can give candidates, but they can kind of freely bundle donations.
2:36:24
And we have examples of lobbyists donating more than a hundred times of their individual limit.
2:36:29
In fact, in the last election, from what we saw, 9 of the top 10 bundlers were either lobbying firms, their employees, or issues in companies that do business with the city.
2:36:40
So as imperative, we make sure we close that band.
2:36:44
Lastly, on the 2 bills on post employment bands, We support the proposal to extend the those restrictions that would apply to sorry.
2:36:55
The restrictions the mayor's office for 2 years, which would be in line with the rules that the executive chamber in Albany.
2:37:01
And we also support expanding posting employment restriction to any agency for policymakers at the mayor's office and the city council and any other high ranking government officials with broad interagency powers.
2:37:14
We do recommend not to include all public servants on the policy maker list and all members of boards and commissions from appearing before any agency.
2:37:24
And that is because of actually, what was mentioned here earlier, our are concerned of the effect would have about the ability of the city to recruit and maintain personnel as well as the size of that group.
2:37:36
Thank you so much for the opportunity to address you today.
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Rachel Fauss, Senior Policy Adviser at Reinvent Albany, on Strengthening Lobbying Laws and Disclosure Requirements in New York City Government
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Blair Horner, Executive Director of NYPIRG on Strengthening Oversight of the Lobbying Industry and Curbing Conflicts of Interest in New York City Government
