Lobbyists wiggle through loophole

Lobbyists and lawmakers continue to take full advantage of the so-called "Grant loophole," according to the 2006 lobbyist spending reports filed this week.

Utah law says that any registered lobbyist who spends on a legislator or an immediate member of the lawmaker's family more than $50 a day — the currency bearing the face of former President Ulysses S. Grant — he must list the lawmaker by name in a financial disclosure report and say how much and for what the money was spent.

Yet, a half-dozen lobbyists spent more than $10,000 last year, much of it for meals, and didn't name on their 2006 reports which legislators were fed. Most notably, a group of lobbyists, including Alan Dayton and Spencer Stokes, took almost two dozen legislators and their spouses on a Nashville dinner cruise during the annual National Conference of State Legislators gathering in August.

The group included senators and representatives from both sides of the aisle.

How can lobbyists spend that much and not report that a single lawmaker received $50 or more at any given event? Over the years, some lobbyists have become experts at splitting the amount of the gift with other lobbyists to get under $50, or paying for part of the gift with the legislator picking up enough of the cost to keep it under $50, or splitting the gift itself. For instance, listing a golf lunch as one gift, green fees as another gift and cart rental as a third gift, to get under the $50 reporting level.

Gary Thorup, a well-known lobbyist, reported total annual spending of $828 but never passed the $50 threshold, although he came close, according to his 2006 report.

Legislators have closed some of those reporting loopholes. But others remain.

Meanwhile, some entities file lobbyist reports but don't list any people as lobbyists, such as the University of Utah and other quasi-government entities.

And some state government employees don't list themselves as lobbyists, even though they spend a lot of time on Capitol Hill during the general session. They make no report of expenditures on legislators — much to the displeasure of some legislators.

You can find lobbyist reports online at the Utah Elections Office, www.utah.gov/lobbyist/lobbysearch.

Some other interesting spending during 2006 includes: