The View From Over Here

Taking Gifts—Bad Public Policy:  Part 2 of 2

          What are the effects of gift taking (in addition to campaign cash) on public policy?  Does it matter that Virginia is ranked 47 out of 50 states for risk of public corruption, about as corrupt as possible?  There is research that shows strong correlation between money accepted and legislative action taken.  Let’s look at a local example of legislative action following money.   

          All state legislators in my NoVA sample mentioned in Part 1 have taken generous gifts from a very influential special interest, Dominion Power, a huge giver of campaign bucks and personal gifts it turns out.  Three got two Redskins tickets worth $500 and one got a $519 “golf trip” to Augusta, Ga.  A few years ago, the folks at Dominion wrote a new law to re-regulate the electric power industry in Virginia.  The result, according to environmental groups, is one of the worst regulatory frameworks in the country.  The law only suggests voluntary action to increase renewable energy use and efficiency, and to reduce pollution, but requires little.  Dominion’s law sailed through House and Senate with near unanimous votes.  Local legislators get serious campaign cash as well as personal gifts from Dominion.  The year the law passed, all VA lawmakers got cash.  Do gifts and campaign cash buy votes?  You be the judge.

          Yet, of the four legislators I communicated with, only two (Senator Howell, Delegate Plum) agreed that if a bill to do so were proposed they would vote to bar gifts; none agreed to commit to stop taking personal gifts voluntarily. 

          Clearly the legislators’ constituents have a different view.  They think it is simply wrong for elected public servants to take gifts from special interests.  One has to wonder why is this so difficult for legislators?                          

          When we talked about why gifts shouldn’t just be barred, here are some legislators’ comments I received: 1-definition of the term gift is blurry and so is the line between gifts and campaign contributions.  (JL-How is taking $500 Redskin tickets from Dominion Power “blurry”?); 2- Do you realize my state salary is the same $18,000 per year as it was when I was first elected over 20 years ago?  (JL-Certainly the salary is too little for what we ask of a legislator, but that does not entitle you to supplement your salary with special interest gifts!); 3- I have Redskin tickets of my own, what is wrong with taking additional tickets so my family can go, too?; 4- The travel (to a project site) could help me understand the issues. (JL-maybe, but if that’s the case, the travel expenses are legitimate public expenses, and should be paid out of appropriations, not a special interest bank account.).

          There are more troubling aspects of this problem.  First, because the laws these folks write are so lax, it is highly likely that the gifts officially reported and duly compiled by the Virginia Public Access Project are but a fraction of gifts taken from special interests.  We now know, for example, that Gov. McDonnell and Attorney General Cuccinelli didn’t report most of their gifts (and stock holdings).  It was only when the Governor’s Chef blew the whistle that the Guv and AG revealed previously unreported gifts, stocks.  There was NO penalty for not having reported them!  So, we not only need to bar gifts, but also, as Senator Northam says, we also need an enforcement mechanism to make it stick.

          Another troubling aspect of this issue is that the legislators seem to feel that personal gifts for self and family, like campaign cash which can diverted for personal use, are entitlements which go with public office.                                           

         I regret I cannot put myself in a legislator’s shoes to understand his/her perspective.  Often elected officials work hard, and it is indeed true that their salaries are not commensurate with the effort and responsibility we expect of them.  And they feel trapped, unable to act to increase their salary for fear the very act of doing so will be used to defeat them in the next election!  And, re-election is what elected officials live for.  Thus, they are reluctant, most even unwilling, to do anything that could jeopardize that--no matter how right the course of action might be. 

          That says a lot about how they perceive us voters and about how likely we are to get things our country actually needs accomplished within this system.