Lawmakers flout gift rules

Neat trick. Some lobbyists and lawmakers have skirted state law by splitting the cost of rounds of golf in St. George. The lobbyist pays $49.99 toward the cost of the green fees and the lawmaker pays the rest. Since state law requires a registered lobbyist to report gifts valued at $50 or greater, lawmakers' names stay off state reporting forms.

The tip-off, of course, is that a round of golf in St. George costs more than $50.

One lobbyist confirmed that lawmakers paid a portion of the green fees to keep their names off the lobbyists' lists, which isn't illegal. But it should pose an ethical dilemma for lawmakers. One penny more and state law would have required that their names be made public.

When this kind of gamesmanship is at work, the public can't follow the money. There is no way to know for certain if access to lawmakers results in them voting one way or another; no way to monitor the company they keep with the positions they espouse. But the point of a reporting law is to permit the public to judge for itself. Skirting the reporting law means the public has incomplete information about lobbyists' gifts, which feeds skepticism about the purity of the legislative process.

Thanks to the reporting of Deseret Morning News political writers Bob Bernick Jr. and Lisa Riley Roche, Utahns know that about a dozen Utah lawmakers went to Southern Utah in early March following the legislative session. Absent names on a report, the identities of the lawmakers and the gift givers cannot be verified. One lobbyists who was in attendance said the group included "a few new" legislators and the same group of "legislators who like to golf." Only the lawmakers and the lobbyists know. Under their careful "compliance" to state law, no one has to tell.

Perhaps the time has some to do away with the dollar limit on gifts and require full disclosure of everything a lobbyist gives a lawmaker, regardless of value. Absent that, lobbyists and lawmakers appear quite adept at exploiting loopholes. A few years ago, some lobbyists were found to be splitting the costs of gifts to circumvent reporting requirements. That's been outlawed but suggests the degree of creativity that some will use to keep their names off public reporting forms.

With full disclosure, there would be no wiggle room for "bashful" givers or receivers — just a transparency that would be a boon to public confidence in the lawmaking process.