Smallest Group Of Lobbyists Takes The Heat

The state House passed a bill this month amid great hoopla to cut money in the budget for public-agency lobbyists.

House Majority Leader Dale Foreman, R-Wenatchee, sponsor of the bill, says the state budget includes $2.4 million for agency lobbyists bent on talking lawmakers into more spending.

But public agency lobbyists are the smallest cadre in the army of lobbyists plying their trade in the Capitol.

There are more than 1,000 lobbyists registered with the Public Disclosure Commission, representing everything from trial lawyers to apple growers.

Their total lobbying fees for the 1995 session: $21,582,156.

Dose of lawfulness needed

Former Rep. Todd Mielke of Spokane, meanwhile, still hasn’t registered with the PDC, even though he’s been lobbying for Johnson and Johnson, the pharmaceutical giant, since the session began in January.

Mielke has been a frequent flier to Olympia from his home in Spokane, walking the hallways of the Capitol, and even receiving a gift from the House Republican Caucus.

Now all Mielke needs to do is walk four blocks down the street to the PDC to sign on the dotted line and comply with the law.

Good ol’ Inland humor

East Side lawmakers have been raising eyebrows over here, where folks are less used to their, shall we say, unique sense of humor.

It was front page news in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer when Senators Bob McCaslin and John Moyer took to the Senate floor to extoll the virtues of the gentler sex.

During a floor debate on a bill to stop businesses from charging women higher prices, McCaslin, R-Spokane, quipped that while women may have to pay more for dry cleaning and haircuts, not all in life is fair.

After all, he said, men have to wear ties.

Moyer, R-Spokane, ever the gentleman, joined in, calling women “the flowers of society. We enjoy opening doors for you. It adds a certain charm to society.”

Sen. Pat Thibaudeau, D-Seattle, sponsor of the bill, was annoyed, saying the guys were trivializing her bill.

The obvious solution, senators agreed: kill the bill. But require a statewide study of the issue.

Can’t be too careful

Rep. Dennis Dellwo, D-Spokane, has learned to keep closer track of his gym bag.

Dellwo, a fitness type, goes running most days during his lunch hour. He recently left his gym bag on the House floor, forgetting it overnight.

By the time he returned to retrieve it the next day, the Legislature’s security guards were about to haul the thing out to the Capitol parking lot and hose it down, in case it was a bomb.

“At least I would have had clean socks,” Dellwo figured.

, DataTimes MEMO: West Side Stories runs every other week.