Transportation Agency May Adopt Rules for Lobbyists : Government: Board member suggests working with other county divisions to avoid differing standards. Federal regulations to be reviewed.

Orange County transportation officials may adopt strong registration and financial-disclosure rules for lobbyists if other agencies, such as the County Board of Supervisors, do the same.

“I’m assuming that it’s inevitable,” said Dana W. Reed, the public’s at-large representative on the Orange County Transportation Authority board.

“I’m receptive,” added Board of Supervisors Chairman Roger R. Stanton, who also chairs OCTA.

The issue arose at Monday’s OCTA board meeting in the wake of several stories in The Times Orange County Edition that detailed lobbying on behalf of clients by former Orange County supervisor Ralph B. Clark in meetings last year with former colleagues and agency staff members.

One of Clark’s clients, SuperBus Inc. of Northern California, won a contract last Oct. 17 when the OCTA board ordered 10 of the company’s innovative vehicles at a cost of $4 million. The vehicles resemble a low-slung horse trailer pulled by a truck cab and are popular both with passengers and drivers.

The Times investigation found that the firm has severe financial problems and has been sued for failure to pay rent on its San Jose offices. As a result, it is now run out of Chief Executive James F. Elder’s home in Saratoga. In addition, the firm is relying on financing from the Mexican government to build the OCTA buses at a new plant in Baja California, as well as for a letter of credit in lieu of the performance bond that is normally required by OCTA. The letter of credit is still being negotiated with OCTA officials. Finally, some of the firm’s officers have been accused in lawsuits of deceptive business practices in deals unrelated to SuperBus.

Elder has strongly defended his company’s ability to deliver buses on time and within budget and has said the charges in the unrelated business ventures are untrue.

Reacting to former supervisor Clark’s activities, political reform activist Shirley Grindle last week urged Stanton to pursue new regulations that would require companies to disclose the names of people they have hired as lobbyists and the amounts they are paid. The idea parallels federal requirements.

At the same time, the county branch of the American Society of Civil Engineers wrote to each county supervisor last week, suggesting that all county contracts contain a section in which companies certify that they have not paid a lobbyist in connection with the contract and won’t pay one after the fact unless the contract specifically allows them to do so.

Grindle is a former County Planning Commission member who wrote the county’s campaign and influence broker registration ordinance known as TIN CUP (Time Is Now, Clean Up Politics). But that county law requires lobbyists to register and disclose their clients only if they make campaign contributions to candidates for the Board of Supervisors.

OCTA’s Reed, who makes his living as a lawyer advising clients about campaign and lobbyist disclosure regulations, stopped short of actually proposing stricter controls on lobbyists during Monday’s meeting. Instead, he referred to recent newspaper articles and editorials on the subject, as well as Stanton’s interest, in making his comment that lobbyist disclosure measures are “inevitable.”

Reed also joked that having each agency write its own ordinance would boost his income as a lawyer but urged OCTA to work with the Board of Supervisors and the county’s Transportation Corridor Agencies to avoid adopting differently worded regulations.

In expressing interest, Stanton said he is not committing to regulations. “The first step that I’ve taken is to ask county counsel to get the federal standards,” Stanton said after the meeting. “I didn’t want to start on reinventing the wheel. I’m just responding to a call that I got from Shirley.”

“Let me see the federal regulations first,” Stanton added. “I’m receptive. But what happens after that remains to be seen.”

Reed said Monday that state regulation of lobbyists is far stricter than the federal government’s. For one thing, the state’s rules include attempts to influence administrative actions by government officials, while the federal law targets efforts to influence Congress and not the bureaucracy as well.

Reed said he would not propose his own ordinance because he believes that it would be “more appropriate” for it to come from the Board of Supervisors.

“I don’t even know that OCTA can legally do it,” Reed said.

OCTA Chief Executive Officer Stanley Oftelie said he would ask the agency’s lawyer whether OCTA has authority to enact lobbyist regulations.