New state ethics reforms banning lobbyists from serving on state boards and commissions could force a sweeping overhaul of the CTA board–including the dismissal of the panel’s new chairman–at a time when it is struggling to implement a controversial Jan. 1 fare hike.
The lobbyist restrictions are part of an ethics package approved by the legislature last week.
After the vote, the Blagojevich administration took the first steps toward purging lobbyists from state positions as it sent urgent notices to 130 boards and commissions–governing everything from state pension systems to universities to the Historic Preservation Agency–asking for information on which members would soon be ineligible to serve, officials said.
Expecting approval of the reforms, some lobbyists serving on state boards resigned their positions in recent months. Others simply removed themselves from the state’s lobbyist registry as they sought to walk a fine line between what is technically considered lobbying and work involving government activities they perform for clients as consultants, publicists or lawyers.
Although the CTA is still evaluating the legislation’s impact, at least three of the seven board posts at the transit agency could be in jeopardy, including those of Carole Brown, who was recently appointed chairman of the agency by Mayor Richard Daley, and Victor Reyes, the mayor’s former political enforcer at City Hall.
Brown is registered with the state as a lobbyist for the investment banking firm Lehman Brothers, where she is a senior vice president. Reyes is a partner in the Greenberg Traurig law firm, where he specializes in representing clients before government agencies.
Another CTA board member, Cynthia Panayotovich, is not a lobbyist but is married to one, former state Rep. Sam Panayotovich. Under the new rules, spouses of lobbyists also will be barred from serving on boards and commissions.
A fourth CTA board member, Susan Leonis, a longtime lobbyist for northwest suburban Rosemont and other entities, canceled her lobbyist registration Tuesday, according to state officials. That could render her eligible to remain on the transit agency’s board.
The potential for such widespread turnover at the helm of the CTA is the latest in a string of controversies, including blistering criticism of the fair hike and a failed attempt over the summer by CTA President Frank Kruesi to push through a pension hike for himself and other top officials at the agency. Recently, Chicago Ald. Dorothy Tillman (3rd) has attacked Brown for her ties to Lehman Brothers after the firm acknowledged in a city filing that its founders owned slaves in the 1850s.
CTA officials said they are beginning to study the ethics package to determine how it applies to board members, according to the agency’s spokeswoman, Noelle Gaffney.
CTA evaluating law
“Basically, we’re just evaluating the implications of the ethics legislation as are individual board members and their firms,” Gaffney said.
Meanwhile, the CTA is advising the board members who are lobbyists that they should refrain from taking any official actions, according to a source familiar with the concerns raised within the agency.
There is some confusion among state officials over how quickly lobbyists must depart from positions on boards and commissions under the new rules. But the Blagojevich administration is approaching the issue as if the lobbyists should be out the door immediately.
“The big picture is that the system is finally changing, and we’re taking steps to eliminate outside influence on the decisions that are made by state boards and commissions,” said Abby Ottenhoff, a Blagojevich spokeswoman. “So we’re ensuring that members [of boards and commissions] are representing the interests of the people of Illinois and not the interests of companies that may be paying them as lobbyists.”
One point of confusion in implementing the legislation is that the package was included in two separate pieces of legislation. One bill, which the legislators chose to enact by overriding the governor’s amendatory veto, states the lobbyists should be removed from boards and commissions created or authorized by the state immediately.
The second bill, approved by lawmakers but yet to signed by the governor despite supportive comments, would move back the date that lobbyists must leave their state posts to Feb. 1.
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The legal questions now hitting the desk of Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan include how to interpret the differences and whether sitting board members who are lobbyists can still case votes in the short term without jeopardizing a board’s actions. Another question is whether case law might support keeping the current members in their posts until the governor chooses replacements.
Questions also have arisen over the wives of some powerful lobbyists, such as Springfield Republican powerbroker William Cellini. State Historic Preservation Agency officials are reviewing the rules to determine whether Julie Cellini, a longtime champion of the new Abraham Lincoln Library, must give up her post as chairman of the agency’s board of trustees.
Some lobbyists acting
But while some people are waiting for a legal interpretation, others have chosen to move on.
Thomas Lamont, for example, withdrew his name from the state’s lobbyist list so that he could remain on the Illinois Board of Higher Education. That action also was designed to allow his wife, Bridget, previously a top policy adviser under former Gov. George Ryan, to keep her paid position on the state’s Educational Labor Relations Board.
“That should cleanse me” from the restrictions in the ban, Lamont said.
He had been registered as a lobbyist for Dell Computer Corp. and the Illinois Auto Auction Association, but he said his activities with Dell had largely focused on legal work and that his work with the auto auction group recently has consisted mostly of tracking legislation.
He said he will make sure his activities are limited and do not fall into any category of lobbying.
Philip R. O’Connor, a Republican member of the State Board of Elections, also pulled his name from the lobbyist rolls. O’Connor said that if he finds in the future that he must lobby the state on behalf of his firm, Constellation New Energy, a provider of electricity, he will re-register as a lobbyist and quit the election’s panel.
Ed Duffy, chairman of the Illinois Community College Board, said he resigned Monday to remain as a lobbyist for Hawthorne National LLC, the combined company of Sportsman’s Park and Hawthorne Race Course.
“I’m on a board where I can’t imagine it would ever be a conflict,” said Duffy, who said his comments do not reflect sour grapes. “But if it gives the public the impression that things are better now than they were before, then it’s a good thing.”
Duffy, a former top official in the administration of Gov. James Thompson, has sat on the Board of Higher Education while public universities are in a dramatic fight to receive their share of public dollars during a fiscal crisis. He said the state benefits from having people with experience on state boards who are willing to work as volunteers.
“It’s important that boards not only have an understanding of the subject matter that they’re overseeing, but also have a keen understanding of the legislative and executive branches of government,” Duffy said. “They are a body politic by nature, and they better have a good understanding of it.
“If they don’t,” he said, “they’ll be operating in a vacuum.”