Lobbyists and their employers reported spending $6.98 million in the 2017 session of the General Assembly. The total matches the record spent in the 2015 session, the most recent 30-day odd-year session.
In the past year, the number of lobbying organizations has increased by nine percent, as Kentucky follows the national trend toward more state lobbying by businesses and interest groups, and more lobbying spending in state capitols. As an illustration of that upward trend, the amount spent in the first three months of 2017 exceeds the amount spent in the entire 12 months of 2001, the first year in which Kentucky held a 30-day session.
As it was in the 2016 session, the top spending lobbying organization this year was the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce, which spent $126,801 in the three-month session. On its website, the Chamber proclaims 2017 as “a record year of legislative victories”, and says its advocacy against minimum wage and maternity leave bills saved the business community $244 million; while its work toward repealing the prevailing wage law saved businesses $190 million.
The Chamber also estimates that businesses will save $117 million thanks to the Chamber’s work to block 1) “transgender bathroom” bills that would have required public schools and state and local governments to designate that bathrooms they control only be used by persons based on their biological sex; and 2) a “religious freedom” bill that would have required that no law shall impair the exercise of rights guaranteed by the constitutions of the United States and Kentucky, including a person’s “right of conscience” or freedom of religion.
Although the Chamber did not include businesses’ estimated cost savings for the “right-to-work” legislation, the charter school bill, or legislation requiring medical review panels, those issues are also characterized as legislative victories by the Chamber.
After the 2016 General Assembly, in which the Chamber spent $149,000 on lobbying, the group’s website called that session “one of the most successful the business community has seen”, citing “pro-business legislative victories” on bills relating to public-private partnerships to finance government projects and services, and additional money for the state’s pension system, along with the defeat of “anti-business tax reform” and renewable energy legislation.
The second-leading spender in the 2017 session was the U.S. Justice Action Network, a Washington, D.C.-based 501(c)(4) group that spent $89,125 lobbying on Senate Bill 120, which was enacted, and includes reforms to the reentry process for convicted felons, including access to occupational licenses for those with a criminal record, and a reentry substance abuse pilot program.
Other top lobbying spenders in the recently concluded General Assembly are:
Altria ($85,347); Marsy’s Law for All ($79,218); Kentucky Hospital Association ($71,132); Kentucky League of Cities ($68,969); Kentucky Justice Association ($57,156); Kentucky Bankers Association ($54,240); Anthem Inc. ($51,000); Greater Louisville, Inc. ($49,329); Kentucky Retail Federation ($46,371); Kentucky Medical Association ($44,472); Norton Healthcare ($44,325); Humana ($41,440); Kentucky Association of Electric Cooperatives, Inc. ($40,012); Home Builders Association of Kentucky ($38,626); Excellence in Education Action ($38,458); AT&T ($38,216); Kentucky Farm Bureau Federation ($35,951); and Kentucky Association of Realtors ($35,272).
