Richard McIntosh answers “What do lobbyists do?”

1. Richard McIntosh answers the question “What do lobbyists do?” When you hear about a lobbyist or they are in the news, they are usually portrayed as Rasputin-like creatures who control legislators, manipulate the legislative process, and only work to enrich their clients at the expense of society. The average citizen will never meet a lobbyist. Even those who may have met one haven’t worked with them. And no one who doesn’t work under a dome really understands what lobbyists actually do for a living. I am Richard McIntosh, President of Flotron Mcintosh, a governmental consulting firm based in Jefferson City, Missouri. We have one of the original 100+ year buildings as our office headquarters on Capitol Avenue, just blocks from the State Capitol. And I am a lobbyist. My career began when at twenty-two years old I served as a Budget Analyst for Senate Appropriations, then became Assistant Director of Governmental Affairs for Attorney General Jay Nixon, and then became the Chief of Staff to the first and as of today, only female, House Majority Floor Leader, Gracia Backer. And now it has been twenty-five years

2. working as a lobbyist, so in total, I have had front row seat to Missouri state government and the political landscape for thirty-five years. People are also reading… • St. Louis archdiocese releases long-awaited report on Catholic slaveholding • Boeing moves forward with 'advanced combat aircraft' site in St. Louis County • Cicadas have laid eggs in the St. Louis region, killing tree branch tips in the process • Baby bear spotted in Ballwin neighborhood Very few of my colleagues cross over into the lobbying corps in Missouri. As a staffer, I wrote an appropriations bill and put together a state budget for a departmental entity. While in Washington there is the revolving door for the reason that you have seasoned and knowledgeable lobbyists; here at home, this is infrequent. While there are other paths to gaining mastery in this profession, a deep knowledge of process and policy is a must. They say it isn’t what you know, it’s who you know; however, when you are a lobbyist who wants to serve the public interest, you need both to represent the client’s interest in front of legislators, bureaucrats, and statewide elected officials. Making public policy is difficult and complex. There are lots of moving parts and no legislator can be an expert in every industry, business, political subdivision, non-profit, etc. The list above is what is commonly referred to as “special interest.” Each and every one has a “special interest.” Even the general taxpayer/citizen has a “special interest” in certain areas. While the term “special interest” has been derided by, well, everyone, the words “special interest” are an accurate description. Representation of these “special interests” is the role a lobbyist steps in and plays. It is our job to explain to a public policy maker how a proposed policy change potentially would affect an industry, business, or region. There is a term used in the Capitol called the “law of unintended

3. consequences.” Many times, a legislator may introduce a piece of legislation with the best of intentions but may not fully understand the impact or the implementation challenges. In general, a lobbyist will go to the legislator to understand the reason for legislation and what the goal is they are trying to achieve. The lobbyist will interpret the legislative outcomes and the vast majority of the time, offer potential changes. At times industry may be diametrically opposed to the bill, and then there is no middle ground. In Missouri, the majority of the time, it is a client who will be seeking changes in law and will hire a lobbyist to help write the bill, seek out appropriate sponsors and work the bill through the legislative process for passage. The other side to the coin is a lobbyist gets hired to either make significant changes to the bill or just kill the bill outright. As for the legislation and policy making itself, there are many, many reasons why legislation gets introduced. Many citizens would be surprised to learn there is a significant amount of legislation introduced every year which simply deals with the general maintenance of running state and local government. Just as cars must go into the shop at times to continue to run, so does government sometimes need an overhaul. New situations arise which need to be dealt with at the state level, such as statutes that need to be modernized while others are no longer relevant and can simply be removed. Controversial bills which garner the media’s attention represent about 2% of the legislation filed. The public would find that most of the bills are as exciting as watching paint dry. Those bills, however, may be of great interest and have significant consequences for a particular industry. When I was the Chief of Staff for the House Majority Floor Leader, I once analyzed the total number of yes and no votes on all the bills brought to the House and Senate floor for debate. When I graphed those numbers, it was a perfect bell-shaped curve. And bell-shape doesn’t change whether the Democrats or Republicans control the legislature. Legislators cannot operate without lobbyists. They simply cannot have the knowledge level to make good public policy for industries, businesses, political subdivisions, and citizens. To give the reader an understanding of exactly what I mean, I performed an experiment when I was the Chief of

4. Staff. I counted the number of issues brought to me by legislators, lobbyists, staff and constituents in the course of a day. I started at 8:00 am and when I reached 2:00 pm, I stopped counting at 80. While there are always going to be a few legislators and lobbyists who engage in bad acts, that is not industry norm for lobbyists. Let me explain the practical aspects of why the perception isn’t true. Wine and Dine – As if any legislator could be bought for a cheap meal in Jefferson City. It is a tremendous insult that a legislator would put themselves through the grueling process of getting elected for wine and dine. Here is the hard truth, legislators and lobbyists are people. And since the beginning of time, humans have enjoyed sitting down and breaking bread. The lobbyist funded dinners decried by media served an important function. It brought together legislators from the two political parties and differing views to socialize, get to know each other and develop professional relationships. It made for less for a less divisive environment in committee hearings and floor debate. The legislative process simply flowed better and as a result better public policy was produced at a higher quality with less mistakes. Missouri has gone through two different initiative petition general elections votes to first limit the amount that a lobbyist could spend on a legislator, and the second one to put in place a complete ban. As a result, the social aspect that put oil in the engine of the legislative relationship process is gone. Now it is rare for D’s and R’s to spend social time together. Everyone stays in their tribe and echo chamber. And while it has reduced lobbyist expenses (thank you very much), the level of lobbyist influence has not been reduced. Trips - The media absolutely loved to report stories about lobbyists taking legislators to sporting events, perceived vacation locations, and other expensive and upscale places. While in Missouri there used to be high profile trips, such as going to the Super Bowl, this didn’t account for the majority of the trips. What the elimination of trips did was prevent the education of legislators and end their exposure to new technology and ideas, or to see in person how industries actually operate. Some of the greatest advancements in improving the efficiency, effectiveness and enhancing the citizen interaction experience with

5. Missouri government came as result of taking legislators to Silicon Valley to the leading technology companies to see what is possible in private industry and government. Whether you realize it or not, a material number of Missouri government technology advancements are a result of those trips and the opportunity it presented for me to educate legislators on technology visions and solutions. Some things only make sense when you see them in person, can ask questions and interact in real time. Some things can only be experienced to be understood. Bribes – Actual, meaningful offers are so rare it is literally not worth discussing. Lobbyists operate only if they have credibility. The engaging of this type of behavior would destroy a lobbyist’s ability to operate in the Capitol on a permanent basis. And the chances of getting caught would be high. Those who think the speed of light is the fastest thing in the universe has never seen the speed of rumor in the Missouri Capitol. Campaign contributions – There are several truths about campaign contributions. First, no politician likes raising money. No lobbyist likes to get campaign contributions requests. But unfortunately, raising money is what it takes to get elected. For those individuals who think that campaign contributions can “buy” a politician doesn’t understand the practical aspects of that concept. No lobbyist has enough money to completely cover the entire legislature and statewide elected officials. The truth is that legislators run for office because they want to make a difference and have their own personal reasons/motivations that has nothing to do with campaign contributions. What is a typical work week like for a lobbyist in legislative session? The typical week for a lobbyist in Missouri starts on a Monday morning answering client phone calls and preparing for committee hearings and legislative floor session in the afternoon. House and Senate go into legislative session on the House and Senate Floor at 4:00 p.m. Depending on the month, they may stay in session and debate

6. bills until around 6:00 p.m. This typically starts occurring sometime in mid-February and will remain constant until the end of legislative session in May. Prior to going into session, both the House and Senate may schedule committee hearings starting around 2:00 p.m. Prior to both term limits and the ban on legislative gifts, the evening would have been filled with dinners with legislators and socializing but in the current environment, small groups of legislators may go to dinner with or without a lobbyist or hang out in bars with lobbyists. Many don’t go out at all. On Tuesday, committee hearings start at 8:00 a.m. House and Senate will go into legislative floor session at 10:00 a.m. Typically, depending on the month, they will debate bills until 12:00 noon. Then committee hearings will start at 12:00 noon and will go on for the rest of the day. Later in the legislative session, the House and Senate may come back into legislative floor debate at 4:00 p.m. and go until 6:00 pm or 7:00 pm. If it is a controversial issue, debate can easily go until 10:00 p.m. or later, sometimes all night. Wednesday is materially the same as Tuesday. On Thursday, committee hearings will begin at 8:00 a.m. and go on until 10:00 a.m. when legislative floor debate begins. This usually lasts until 12:00 noon. Then the House and Senate will adjourn for the week and head home. However, some committee hearings will occur on Thursday afternoon from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. Some legislators at the far corners of the state will have four-hour drives. Which they will turn around and repeat on Monday morning. Friday is a catch-up day in the office. This day is filled with communicating with clients, emails, drafting amendments, researching bills and preparing for next week’s legislative floor session and committee hearings. Whether the lobbyist testifies for a bill or attends committee hearings to monitor bills of interest, Friday is the day that hearings for the next week are typically posted; however, some hearings get posted on Monday morning. And in-between all of these committee hearings and floor debate, a lobbyist will seek out a legislator to give them information on specific client issues and may ask them their position on any given issue. A week in legislative session is a flat-out, dead run the entire week. You wake up on Monday morning and then the next thing you know, it is Thursday afternoon. Everyone is ready for the legislators to go home

7. (including the legislators). Assuming you aren’t exhausted or brain dead from the week, you go to office to try and reduce the number of things you have to do on Friday. Then you reset for the next week of legislative session. That is when everything goes according to plan. And nothing ever goes according to plan. A lobbyist will typically pick up new clients during legislative session and their new issues get incorporated into flow of the rest of the client interests. And then you have attacks on clients’ interests that you may or may not be able to anticipate. As well as opportunities to advance a client’s interest that you may or may not be able to anticipate. And then on top of all of that, the political human element gets thrown into the mix. While that element is always present through the entire week, at times it becomes much more intense and unpredictable. In short, legislative session is rolling chaos. It takes a very high degree of knowledge and skill set to survive, no less be successful. About 25% of the lobbying corps has this knowledge and skill set. 50% is somewhere on the spectrum of having pieces and parts of knowledge and skill set. The remaining 25%, not so much on either. In summary, it is impossible to put into actual words to describe/illustrate/define/convey the reality of legislative session to experience. What are my specialties? There are three main components to how government operates. Expenditure of dollars, execution of current existing laws and the process of making new laws. My professional positions mirrored these three components. First, as a budget analyst for the Senate Appropriations provided the fiscal background to understand the process and flow of the expenditure of dollars. Second, my position in the Missouri Attorney General’s Office provided an understanding on the execution of current existing laws. Third, my position as the Chief of Staff to the House Majority Floor Leader gave me intimate knowledge of the process to make new laws. With the Lord’s blessing and guidance to which I give the honor and glory, not of my own hand or pride, our governmental consulting practice has flourished and prospered. Because of the experiences listed above, we specialize in Appropriation work. We help get clients appropriations or we work to help state departments receive funding for certain programs and

8. many times new technology modernization projects or upgrades. State government can either scale with additional people or can scale with new technology. Technology is far less expensive. It is sometimes difficult for state departments to self-validate their needs. Help from entities outside of government is invaluable. In the process of execution of existing laws, state government contracts for a significant number of goods and services. Our firm has helped for-profit businesses and non-profits capture billions upon billions of dollars in state funding. And many of the business contracts last seven years, and we have non-profits who have running contracts in excess of fifteen years. We have also worked on the passage of numerous pieces of difficult, complex, at times controversial, statutory changes over the past 25 years of our firm. What have I accomplished as a lobbyist? / Why does someone want to be a lobbyist? What I have accomplished as a lobbyist is a question I often ask myself. Particularly after hard days and stressful situations. In balance to those thoughts, I am reminded of the numerous individuals, businesses, non- profits, and the taxpayers who have helped and made a significant difference in their lives and to the citizens of the State of Missouri as a whole. I could laundry list a number of pieces of legislation I either thought up or assisted in passage, but over 35 years in state government, the list would fill numerous pages. While some of the large pieces of legislation would be recognizable, many of the others would require explanations to give context regarding the significance and relevance. The same applies to appropriations and state procurement work. It would be billions and billions of dollars of both appropriations and state contracts. As to the question of why someone wants to be a lobbyist, I can only give you my perspective. As a former policy making staff position, I could go home every day and lay my head on my pillow knowing that I had worked to make things better for the lives of 5.2 million Missourians. It was an honor to work in, with and around the Missouri Legislature, period. In college, in my senior year capstone course, the professor a grizzly, no-bs, WWII veteran, he gave the class a piece of advice, “If you can find a job that is interesting 10% of the time, you had better take it.” All of the staff

9. positions I held were interesting if not fascinating about 80% to 90% of the time. To establish a large sized, multi-faceted, governmental consulting firm, you have to be entrepreneurial and have the desire to run a business. And I discovered that as I represented clients, I was solving the exact same problems I worked on as staff. When we take on a new client, we first ask ourselves if the client’s goals are the right thing to do and will it have a positive impact. Additionally, we analyze to make sure we can be successful for the client. If those conditions can’t be met, then we probably shouldn’t be taking them as a client. We have a saying in our firm that clients with questionable motives seek out and hire lobbyists who have the same questionable motives. One of the exciting things about being a lobbyist is the exposure to a ton of various issues, problems and opportunities. To my former college professor, I would tell him that I found a job that is interesting at least 90% of the time. At times, you relish the other 10%. The political process provides an opportunity to see individuals at literally both their very best and very worse. Often you get to see both in the course of a single day. There are times when you fight bitterly with someone in the morning and are fully prepared to continue the fight into the afternoon, but the legislative process rotates, and an issue or bill comes up that the individual you fought with in the morning is now the same individual you have to work with in the afternoon because you are now on the same side. It has happened to me more times than I care to count. Why no one inside the lobbying industry talks It is a remarkable world, filled with the opportunities to regale countless political war stories that the average citizen would either be fascinated or appalled or both at the same time. One reason it is so little known is because the details can be quite personal to the client. It many times involves information which is sensitive and could/would be taken out of context without a view of the bigger picture. Many times, there is a signed non-disclosure which legally prevents it. And the rest of the time people would find what occurs somewhat difficult to believe. The lobbying world is everything in the real world, on steroids.

10. The vast majority of the time a client hires a lobbyist when their hair is on fire, and they are in a crisis. When we get hired to solve a problem or address a situation, we are not just fixing the problem, we also become a counselor, someone who they can confide in without the fear of disclosure. There very much is a lobbyist/client privilege of non-disclosure and confidentiality. We build careers, transform an individual into one with greater self-confidence, and at times, help them gain the tools to make better decisions. We do it all. I have come to the conclusion that the mainstream media are frequently frustrated by public policy making individuals/entities. They may sit on the sidelines and criticize, complain, insinuate, accuse, and take creative license with the truth. There are times they do a good job on an issue, but that former heavily outweighs the former. You will be hard pressed to find a positive story on a lobbyist. So as a result, lobbyist are trained to keep silent. Which further adds to myths and legends about the practice of lobbying. I wrote this article not as an apologetic for lobbying but to give a small glimpse into our world.