Senate leader Balfour piles up freebies

In all, lobbyists reported giving Balfour tickets to more than 120 events over the past six years, worth about $22,000, according to disclosures reviewed by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

“I think some people go to dinners [with lobbyists], and I go to ballgames,” said Balfour, who was wearing a Masters golf shirt when he signed up Friday to run for another legislative term.

It is that matter-of-fact attitude about how things work at the Capitol that has, at times, rubbed ethics advocates wrong.

“He is the poster boy for what we are trying to stop,” William Perry, executive director of Common Cause Georgia, said earlier in the week.

Which might make it all the more surprising that on Friday the Snellville Republican signed a pledge pushed by Common Cause to back a $100 cap on lobbyist gifts to lawmakers.

Depending on how the cap is interpreted, about 75 of the ticketed events Balfour has attended in recent years would be over the limit.

Balfour didn’t just sign the pledge. On the day he qualified to run for an 11th term, he doubled-down on ethics, promising to co-sponsor the $100 cap as well as legislation making the General Assembly subject to the state’s Open Records Act.“Ethics are one of the most important issues in government,” Balfour said in a statement. “There have been many disagreements over ethics the last two years, but the time has come to move forward on these common principles.”

Balfour isn’t the only legislator to attend games and other events on the special interest dime. Many get tickets from lobbyists, who handed out more than $125,000 worth of tickets to events last year.

But a spot check of top lawmakers shows Balfour is in a league of his own. For instance, lobbyists reported giving House Speaker David Ralston, no shrinking violet when it comes to freebies, tickets to 13 events in 2010 and 2011. They reported giving Balfour tickets to 45.

In recent months Balfour, chairman of the powerful Senate Rules Committee, has come under fire from ethics advocates, who say he helped kill legislation setting a $100 cap on lobbyist gifts to lawmakers. They made the gregarious New Jersey native and Waffle House executive a prime target in their war against what they consider statehouse corruption.

Most recently, a tea party activist from Balfour’s district filed a complaint alleging that he abused his position by billing the state for mileage while out of town on lobbyist-funded trips. Balfour said he reimbursed the state for the “minor mistakes” and filed corrected paperwork. He said the complaint smacks of “campaign politics.”

But that hasn’t quelled the criticism that Balfour is one of the leading lawmakers who benefit from the Capitol’s free-market, lobbyist-fueled approach to policymaking and politics.

‘No problem’ with gift cap

It’s not just do-gooders like Common Cause or the tea party who are promoting ethics law changes. State Republican Party leaders agreed to put a question on the July 31 primary ballot to find out if voters want to limit how much lobbyists spend on lawmakers. The outcome is not binding, and Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, has come out strongly against the proposal. He argues transparency — regular reporting of lobbyists’ gifts — works better than spending caps.

Balfour said he has “no problem” with a cap on gifts.

When asked if the sports tickets influence his decisions as a legislator, he said, “Not any more than being taken to dinner or anything else.”

“I get invited to Braves games and I have season tickets myself,” he said. “So I may be sitting in seats that aren’t even as good as my own seats.”

A graduate of Bob Jones and Fairleigh Dickinson universities, Balfour is known as a hard worker who does his homework. He can be strong-willed: One Capitol veteran said when he’s with you, he’s with you, and when he’s not, you know it. He is typically unflappable in public, and he can get to the heart of an issue as well as anybody at the statehouse.

One of most powerful

As rules chairman, Balfour plays a big role in deciding which bills hit the Senate floor. That makes him one of the most powerful lawmakers under the Gold Dome.

As a result, he is glad-handed and buttonholed by lobbyists any time he’s in the statehouse. He is questioned by reporters about most major pieces of legislation. He raises campaign money at a prodigious rate: The $740,000 he had in his account as of March 31 topped all others in the General Assembly.

Balfour seldom faces serious opposition for re-election, although he has both a primary and general election challenge this year.

He served as president of the National Conference of State Legislatures, and he frequently travels the country on politics and business.

Besides running the Rules Committee, he has been seen as a kind of legislative patron saint of Georgia Gwinnett College, working to get the school millions of extra dollars in startup funding.

He helped develop and sell this year’s major tax legislation, which phases out the annual property tax on cars and the sales tax on energy used in manufacturing and could make more Internet sales subject to taxes.

He has traditionally been among the leading beneficiaries of the dinners and tickets special interests dole out, so ethics coalition members figured it wouldn’t be easy to get the lobbyist gift cap out of his committee during the latest legislative session.

Sen. Joshua McKoon, R-Columbus, who sponsored the ethics bill, said the lack of a gift cap “sends a message that there is a ‘For Sale’ sign on the Gold Dome.”

Balfour’s Rules Committee didn’t take up his proposal.

Lobbyists lavish in giving

Most of the $1.8 million lobbyists reported spending on state officials last year went for food and drinks.

But many lobbyists represent big businesses or government agencies with plenty of tickets to sporting events and concerts.

The Georgia World Congress Center Authority, for instance, doled out more than $20,000 in tickets to lawmakers last year for everything from Falcons and college football games to boat shows and wrestling matches.

Lobbyist reports show Balfour has received event tickets from the World Congress Center 20 times over six years.

Jennifer LeMaster, spokeswoman for the authority, said the Dome tickets are for the organization’s suite. Board members and lawmakers on the authority’s legislative overview committee get priority on the tickets. Until recently, Balfour was a member of that committee.

The authority has important business with the General Assembly. The World Congress Center regularly gets bond money from the Legislature for expansion and maintenance projects. The authority operates the Georgia Dome, home of the Falcons.

The Falcons and the Georgia World Congress Center Authority have been in negotiations for more than a year over building a new downtown stadium. The General Assembly two years ago approved an extension of the tax that could help pay for a new stadium.

Balfour received tickets to Georgia Tech basketball and football games 24 times during that same six-year period.

Dene Sheheane, the school’s top lobbyist at the Capitol, said Balfour has served on a Georgia Tech advisory board of business leaders. So it makes sense he would spend more time on campus than other legislators, he said. The tickets are paid for with money from one of the school’s fundraising foundations.

Tech is part of the University System of Georgia, which this year received $1.8 billion in state funding. Lawmakers also approved a $59 million building for the school in next year’s budget.

Sheheane listed spending about $19,000 on state officials during football season last year. A University of Georgia lobbyist reported spending more than $23,000 during that period.

Lawmakers attending Tech games generally interact with top school officials and professors in the president’s box or at special events.

“Having elected officials on campus provides us with the opportunity to showcase research and projects of state interest,” Sheheane said. “The ballgames provide us an opportunity to have discussion throughout the game about what is going on across the campus.”

Over a five-year period before the NHL’s Thrashers left town, lobbyists for auto dealers, the oil industry and SCANA Energy reported taking Balfour to 16 hockey games. The lobbyists have paid for dozens of hockey tickets for lawmakers over the years.

In 2007, a Coca-Cola lobbyist reported giving Balfour tickets to the NCAA Final Four. In 2008, a Comcast lobbyist reported giving him tickets to the NHL All-Star game. That same year, a Georgia-Pacific lobbyist came up with tickets to a race at Bristol Motor Speedway in Tennessee.

In 2009, it was free tickets from the folks who run the Georgia Aquarium, tickets to a Phillies suite from Georgia Public Strategies, golf tournament tickets from AT&T, tickets to two Atlanta NASCAR races from Georgia Power and a season’s worth of football tickets.

In 2010, besides the usual game and concert tickets, a Coke lobbyist reported giving Balfour Washington Nationals tickets.

In 2011, lobbyists from the powerful Troutman Sanders firm reported giving him nearly $800 worth of tickets to a sold-out Bon Jovi concert while he was in Washington. The World Congress Center Authority executive director and lobbyists reported giving him more than $800 worth of tickets to WrestleMania at the Georgia Dome in April.

During one three-day period at the beginning of September, public and private client lobbyists reported giving Balfour tickets to a Tech football game, a Falcons preseason game, a Braves game and the Chick-fil-A kickoff game between UGA and Boise State. Total value: $1,028.

Later in the year, a lobbyist from Southern Strategy Group reported paying for his ticket to Epcot Center in Florida, where Balfour was attending a conference.

Balfour said lobbyists taking him to games don’t necessarily talk to him about legislation. He said he was recently taken to an NBA game (he is not a big NBA fan) “and nobody asked me for anything.”

Senate President Pro Tem Tommie Williams, who also signed the lobbyist gift cap pledge, has had the opposite experience in recent years.

“There was a time in years gone by when it was not appropriate to talk about political matters at dinner,” Williams said. “Now that’s the time they want to talk about legislation. It’s not partying. It’s eating and finding out what their take is on bills.”

Debbie Dooley, a tea party activist from Dacula, which is in Balfour’s district, said locals know of the Gwinnett senator’s reputation as someone who accepts a lot of meals and gifts from lobbyists.

“People believe if you are an elected official responsible for taxpayer money, you should not accept gifts and stay away from any appearance of impropriety,” she said.

Dooley has filed an ethics complaint against Balfour, and threatened to run against him. Instead, the incumbent wound up with one Democratic and two Republican opponents, so she didn’t qualify last week to run against him.

Perry, of Common Cause, said Balfour’s practice of getting tickets to games and other events from lobbyists “is a fine example” of the largesse the ethics coalition wants to stop.

“One hundred twenty tickets shows you these people are leading a legislative lifestyle that has become about sports tickets, fancy dinners and trips,” he said. “That is what we are trying to end.”

At the same time, Perry praised Balfour’s decision to sign the pledge to support a cap on lobbyist gifts.

“When the Republican Party in this state decides to put it on the ballot because people feel that strongly about it, that sends a message,” he said. “I think Senator Balfour has heard that message.”