Roth’s Meetings Raise Questions About Lobbying Ban : Politics: Authorities investigate whether former Orange County supervisor is breaking plea bargain agreement to stop such activity for four years.

Less than nine months after he agreed to a four-year ban on lobbying activities, convicted former Orange County Supervisor Don R. Roth has begun meeting with county transportation planners on behalf of a local engineer who wants money for a bus research project.

The engineer, Jack Brennan of Fullerton, said the 72-year-old Roth proved crucial in making introductions for him, helping him get access to Orange County Transportation Authority officials to pitch a stalled idea for converting county buses to battery power.

“Obviously, he knew people at OCTA,” Brennan said in an interview. “If I’d have picked up the phone and made a cold call, I probably wouldn’t have gotten the attention” accorded by OCTA officials after Roth interceded on his behalf.

The recent meetings raise questions about whether Roth violated a lobbying ban included in the plea bargain agreement he signed March 25--an agreement that ended a yearlong influence-peddling probe and allowed the former supervisor to avoid the prospect of jail time. As part of the agreement, he pleaded guilty to seven violations of the Political Reform Act involving illegal gifts from business people.

Dana Reed, a lawyer who represented Roth during the investigation, said Roth did not want to discuss the issue Friday. But Reed maintained that--contrary to prosecutors’ assertions--Roth is free to lobby anyone he wants on the local level, because of loopholes in the way prosecutors drafted the agreement.

“I am certain that he has been complying with the agreement,” Reed said.

After being contacted by The Times earlier this week about the propriety of Roth’s activities, district attorney’s officials questioned several people familiar with Brennan’s project about the former supervisor’s apparent lobbying, according to those interviewed by the office’s investigators.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Guy Ormes said in an interview that investigators want to determine whether Roth violated the four-year ban on lobbying. “If we believe there was a probation violation, we would file a petition and take it back in front of the judge . . . potentially subjecting (Roth) to additional punishment,” Ormes said.

In securing the agreement last spring, Ormes said, prosecutors wanted to ensure that Roth would not be able to attract business clients by offering to use his influence with people over whom he once had authority. Roth was among the county’s most powerful politicians before his guilty plea. “That was specifically the kind of thing we were trying to avoid,” Ormes said.

Roth pleaded guilty in March to seven misdemeanor charges that he received thousands of dollars in home improvements, landscaping, rent, meals and other gifts from people doing business with the county.

The plea agreement, reached less than a month after Roth resigned from the Anaheim-area supervisorial district he held for more than five years, also set several other conditions: It required Roth to pay $50,100 in fines, perform 200 hours of community service and serve three years probation, and barred him from seeking elective office for four years.

State government codes define a lobbyist as anyone who is paid or receives “economic consideration” to influence legislative or administrative actions before “any elective state official, agency official or legislative official.”

Ormes said that other sections of the government code make it clear that the term agency means both state and local agencies, while Reed contends that the agreement prohibits Roth only from lobbying state officials.

One key issue is whether Roth was to receive anything for helping Brennan.

A retired engineer who worked in the aerospace industry for 30 years, Brennan said he has not paid Roth any money to help him with the project. But he added that “from my perspective, if the thing were to take off and we got production orders, then certainly I would consider having Don be involved (financially) in doing some marketing and things.”

Brennan said he and Roth had not directly discussed any future financial relationship in the project, but added: “I’m sure that could have been in the back of his mind.”