Reform Urged on Rules for O.C. Lobbyists

Local campaign reform advocates are urging Board of Supervisors Chairman Roger R. Stanton to impose new requirements on companies that receive county business, forcing them to disclose whether they have hired lobbyists and say how much they have paid them.

“I think the public should know who’s involved in these contract awards,” said former Orange County Planning Commission member Shirley L. Grindle, who added that she discussed the idea with Stanton last week. “This is done at the federal level. I don’t see any reason why it shouldn’t be done here.”

The idea parallels federal requirements and was first proposed locally by Grindle several years ago. However, it has received new attention after disclosures regarding a controversial “SuperBus” contract that was awarded last summer by the County Transportation Authority.

The company that builds that bus had hired former Supervisor Ralph B. Clark to serve as an adviser, though Clark says he did not help the firm win its Orange County contract. Only after awarding the no-bid, $4-million agreement to SuperBus did local officials learn that the firm had been accused of failing to pay rent on its suite of offices in San Jose. Officials also later discovered that the officers of the company are being sued for fraud in unrelated business deals.

Top County Transportation Authority officials met Wednesday to discuss the questions surrounding the company, which were first disclosed in The Times Orange County Edition last week. Stanley Oftelie, executive director of the Transportation Authority, asked two of his department chiefs to prepare a memo outlining some of the issues raised by the controversy.

In particular, Oftelie said he asked those officials to investigate whether taxpayer money has been adequately safeguarded and whether the agency’s contracting procedures need to be strengthened. The department chiefs are expected to report back to Oftelie on Friday.

Grindle said that she and Stanton discussed the issue of new lobbyist rules in the wake of the SuperBus disclosures and questions about Clark’s role in the contract. She described the supervisor as “receptive to the idea.”

Among those calling for reform is prominent Santa Ana architect Ralph G. Allen, who has long supported tougher disclosure laws on lobbyists and has even drafted a proposed resolution.

“I think this is needed as a bare minimum,” Allen said. “At least it shines a light on these people, making them tell who they’ve hired and how much they’re paying.”

Stanton was unavailable for comment, but he has long backed strict disclosure and campaign fund-raising laws. He is among the board’s most vocal supporters of a $1,000 contribution cap in county campaigns, for instance, an issue that county voters will consider in June.

But Supervisor Gaddi H. Vasquez, who also backs that proposal, said he was not ready to state a position on the lobbyist disclosure idea.

“I haven’t thought a great deal about it, other than one conversation that I had with Shirley (Grindle) a long, long, long time ago,” Vasquez said.

Frank Michelena, one of the county’s most prominent lobbyists, said he did not think any new disclosure requirements were needed.

“But it doesn’t make any difference to me one way or another,” Michelena said. “I’ll abide by the law whatever it is.”

Another top county lobbyist, Lyle A. Overby, said he had no opinion on the issue.

Grindle has long criticized the practices of Michelena, Overby and other lobbyists, and she repeated those concerns Wednesday, warning in particular of the problems she believes are created when county officials become lobbyists and then do business with their former colleagues.

“Even though I’m a friend of Ralph Clark’s, I don’t think he should be doing lobbying work at the county,” Grindle said. She added that Clark’s tenure in county government left him with friends and former aides throughout the bureaucracy. Other former county officials, including Overby and former Supervisor Phil Anthony, have turned to lobbying after leaving their government posts.

As proposed, the disclosure requirement would not prevent Clark or any other former county official from lobbying his former colleagues, but it would force such lobbying to be publicly disclosed.

Current county law requires lobbyists to register and disclose their clients, but only if they make significant campaign contributions to candidates for the Board of Supervisors. Most county lobbyists avoid that requirement by holding their personal contributions below the threshold that triggers the disclosure requirement.

Times staff writer Jeffrey A. Perlman contributed to this report.