Proposed Crackdown on Lobbyists Is Sent to Council

A proposed Los Angeles ordinance that for the first time would require disclosure of the names of all lawyers who lobby on behalf of their clients was sent to the City Council Thursday as part of a sweeping lobbyist reform measure.

Under the proposal, anyone who earns more than $1,000 a year by lobbying the City Council or city agencies would have to register with the city clerk, disclose the names of clients, the reason they have been hired, the project or development for which they are lobbying and the project’s address and council district.

Under the city’s current ordinance, lobbyists are required to register and to disclose for whom they are working, but must provide little information about the reasons for their lobbying activities.

In most cases, the city cannot require lawyers to register as lobbyists because they are governed by state law. But the new ordinance would require that clients disclose their lawyers’ lobbying activities in “quasi-judicial matters,” where lawyers are now exempt.

Those cases include “extremely sensitive and often controversial matters” such as subdivision issues, zoning variances, conditional-use and project permits and police permits, according to Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky.

“These are the very decisions that often provoke the most heated community discussion and therefore the greatest necessity for applicants to hire lobbyists,” Yaroslavsky said.

The provision to include reporting of lawyers through their clients was inserted in the measure Thursday at Yaroslavsky’s request.

Councilman Michael Woo, chairman of the Ad Hoc Committee on Governmental Ethics, said Thursday that the current ordinance is poorly enforced.

As committee chairman, Woo sent the measure to the council Thursday even though there were too few committee members present to vote on it. He said the full council will probably vote on the measure before Christmas.