OFF PAGE ONE
LOBBYISTS: Clients must report total amount
spent on lobbying expenses to ethics commission
East Oregonian
Page 8A
Continued from 1A
others also have people — sometimes
from their own hometowns — who
work as lobbyists on their behalf.
Tammy Dennee
Tammy Dennee, for example,
represents dairy farms like ThreeMile
Canyon Farms near Boardman as an
in-house lobbyist for the Oregon Dairy
Farmers Association. She previously
lived in Pendleton, where she served
as executive director for the Oregon
Wheat Growers League.
One of the bills she was most
focused on last week was SB197,
the “dairy air” Senate bill that would
require setting up air monitoring for
dairies. Farmers want to make sure
that the bill does not overly burden
their operations.
“The details of that are still in
flux so we are monitoring that very
closely,” she said.
On Monday, an alternative to SB
197 was made possible by Three Mile
Canyon Farms and Lost Valley Ranch,
a proposed large dairy nearby, which
have agreed to devise “best manage-
ment practices” to control emissions
and prevent haze in the Columbia
Gorge, said Sen. Mike Dembrow,
D-Portland.
Dembrow, chair of the Senate
Environment and Natural Resources
Committee, will participate in a work
group setting best management prac-
tices, along with representatives of the
Oregon Department of Agriculture
and Oregon State University.
Tuesday is the deadline for bills to
either head to the House and Senate
floor or die in committee, so lobbyists
were busy last week trying to shore up
last-minute support or opposition for
bills affecting those they represent.
Dennee said when the legislative
session is over she will switch her
focus to state agencies that will be
tasked with rulemaking for the bills
that passed. She will also spend plenty
of time traveling around the state to
meet with dairy farmers, educating
lawmakers and the public about dairy
issues and monitoring new develop-
ments in the industry that may be the
subject of future legislation.
“Anything affecting our producers,
anything and everything, we pay
attention to that,” she said.
Clients of registered lobbyists
are required to submit a report to the
Oregon Ethics Commission each year
on the total amount of money they
spent on lobbying expenses (which
does not include campaign contribu-
tions). For 2015 those reports totaled
more than $35.86 million between
1,084 different clients. The Oregon
Dairy Farmers Association spent
$37,992 on lobbying that year.
Katie Fast
Katie Fast is executive director of
Oregonians for Food and Shelter, which
represents growers, manufacturers
and distributors on issues pertaining to
pesticides, fertilizers and biotechnology.
One of their priority bills, which would
require at least seven days’ advance
notice to the State Forestry Department
of the time and location of aerial appli-
cation of pesticides in privately owned
forestland, was up for a committee vote
on Thursday.
“They have to apply when weather
conditions are optimal,” she said,
explaining why pesticide applicators
opposed the bill.
For Fast, who has a degree in agri-
cultural sciences from Oregon State
University, these issues are personal as
well as professional — she grew up on
a family farm and she and her husband
own a farm outside of Salem.
“Everything going on affects us
personally,” she said.
Oregonians for Food and Shelter
spent $37,470 on lobbying expendi-
tures in 2015.
Danelle Romain
While some lobbyists are
employees of a specific corporation
or association, others work as an
independent contractor representing
multiple groups. In-house lobbyists
tend to be subject-matter specialists
while contract lobbyists tend to come
to the profession via law school.
Danelle Romain of The Romain
Group said her law degree helps greatly
when reading bills that are hundreds of
pages long. Being an attorney can help
her know when a single instance of the
word “may” being changed to “shall”
could completely change the bill’s
impact on the way a client is allowed
to operate.
Romain’s clients with Eastern
Oregon ties include the Oregon Beer
and Wine Distributors Association,
Oregon People’s Utility District
Association, Oregon Lions Sight &
Hearing Foundation and the Oregon
Fuels Association (which spent
$48,000 on lobbying in 2015). One of
the bills she is working on this session
would allow self-service gas 24 hours
a day in Oregon counties with less
than 40,000 residents.
Romain said an important part of
lobbying is helping legislators and
agencies making the rules to under-
stand her clients’ industries while in
return helping her clients understand
proposed legislation. It’s a business of
relationships, she said, and working
together to find solutions everyone is
willing to accept.
“It’s fun being a lobbyist, and
helping shape state policy,” she said.
Craig Campbell
Campbell is also an independent
lobbyist. Among The Victory Group’s
12 clients are Umatilla Electric
Cooperative, Oregon Association of
Hospitals & Health Systems, Oregon
Association of Chiefs of Police and
Oregon State Sheriff’s Association.
Umatilla Electric Cooperative spent
$279,423 on lobbying in 2015.
Campbell influenced his first piece
of legislation at age 12 during his
childhood butterfly collecting phase,
when he helped his father Larry Camp-
bell, a state representative at the time,
draft legislation to make the Oregon
swallowtail butterfly the state butterfly.
From his college days on, he
worked in the state capitol in one
capacity or another, including as a
legislative assistant and on staff for
Gov. Ted Kulongoski, where he helped
create the Oregon Youth Authority.
Campbell said over the years Salem
has gotten less about policy and more
about politics, with fewer instances of
people disagreeing on the House or
Senate floor but then going out for a
beer together at the end of the night.
That makes lobbying more difficult, as
does the addition of a short legislative
session in even-numbered years.
Lobbyists and politicians used to
have about 18 months for “thoughtful
discussions” about legislation and
budgets that would work for both sides,
Campbell said, but now they have half
that time to come to an understanding
before the next session. It is still
important to work with the opposite
side and other lobbyists, however, if
you want a seat at the table.
“You can just be ‘I oppose,’ but
that really doesn’t help you in the long
run,” he said.
Successful lobbyists have “no
permanent friends and no permanent
enemies,” as the saying in Salem goes,
because with 3,000 bills considered
each session, two lobbyists can be
working together on one piece of
legislation but be on opposite sides for
another.
———
Contact Jade McDowell at
jmcdowell@eastoregonian.com
or
541-564-4536. The Capital Bureau
contributed to this story.
Tuesday, April 18, 2017
GUNS: NRA, local gun rights
advocates are opposed to the bill
individual, Hopkins said.
Yuille knows the exact date
her father, Michael Passalacqua
of Milwaukie, went to a gun
shop and bought the firearm he
used to kill himself. She found a
receipt dated July 18, 2016, after
his death.
“If I had known that a tool
like the extreme risk protection
order was available I would
have used it, and my dad
probably wouldn’t have been
able to go buy a gun that day,”
Yuille testified Monday during a
hearing on the bill.
Two other bills, proposed by
Gov. Kate Brown, would close
several gun purchase loopholes
and study reasons for gun
purchase denials.
One bill closes the so-called
“Charleston” loophole that
allows applicants to buy a gun
within three days regardless of
whether Oregon State Police
has completed a mandatory
background check on the buyer.
Another bill bans people who
have stalking convictions or
boyfriends who have domestic
violence convictions from
having a gun.
Continued from 1A
Boquist’s son, Seth Sprague,
a 31-year-old U.S. Navy
veteran, used a firearm to
commit suicide Feb. 16, 2016.
The tragedy spurred Boquist
to work with Senate Majority
Ginny Burdick, D-Portland, to
design legislation that could
help families intervene when a
loved one threatens to take their
own life. The bill is modeled
after a measure voters approved
last year in Washington.
The National Rifle Associa-
tion and local gun rights advo-
cates are opposed to the bill.
“This bill allows for a protec-
tive order to take away your
Second Amendment rights, not
because of a criminal conviction
or mental health adjudication but
based on third-party allegations,
using an evidentiary standard
that falls far below what is
normally required for removing
a firearm,” said Keely Hopkins,
the NRA’s Oregon liaison.
The bill also does nothing
to stop someone from killing
themselves in some other way
or to provide treatment for the
VOICE: ‘They want to know what the
thoughts are of the people back home’
front of committees. A busload
of protesters from the Portland
area also thronged the capitol
steps, holding signs about the
effects of homelessness under
a giant banner reading “Oregon
Families Need Rent Control.”
Free public online access to
everything from bill amend-
ments to video of committee
hearings has made it easier than
ever for the public to get involved
in lobbying their legislators.
Katie Fast, director of Orego-
nians for Food and Shelter, said
that while lobbyists who know
the system can be effective in
educating legislators about an
issue, lawmakers take seriously
the concerns of their constituents
who take the time to come to
Salem, write a letter or make a
phone call.
“They want to know what the
thoughts are of the people back
home,” she said. “A lot of times
that’s more powerful than what
I can do.”
Continued from 1A
let the legislators know they
supported HB2996 and SB849,
which would allow first-time
home buyers to put aside up to
$50,000 over 10 years tax-free
in order to save up for a down-
payment. They also supported
rebates for replacement of wood-
burning stoves and low-interest
loans for septic tank repairs, and
talked about the need for legis-
lation addressing the shortage
of appraisers in the state. They
opposed a bill that would make
landlords pay up to $4,500 to
tenants in no-cause evictions.
“According to Sen. Hansell
this bill has failed, so we’re
happy about that,” she said.
Frederickson said the Real-
tors’ annual day at the capitol is
always interesting, and a good
way to network.
On Wednesday citizens
also traveled to the capitol to
testify about various bills in
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