On a sunny Friday at the end of August, a group of lobbyists flocked to the Mississippi River city of Rock Island to complete the northwestern Illinois swing of what has become known as the summer legislative golf tour.
This time, they lugged their clubs to a fundraiser on behalf of state Rep. Joel Brunsvold of Milan, Ill., a 14-year lawmaker and an assistant leader to House Speaker Michael Madigan (D-Chicago).
As at many of the other stops on the tour last summer, the Cable Television & Communications Association of Illinois chipped in. It donated $500 to co-sponsor the event, which allowed Brunsvold to give away a TV set as a special prize.
Two months later, when the lobbyists and legislators returned to Springfield for the fall veto session, Brunsvold became the cable industry’s caddy in the Illinois General Assembly.
Shortly after 6 p.m. Oct. 30, as lawmakers were packing up on the final night of the fall session’s first week, the House overwhelmingly passed an industry-written bill sponsored by Brunsvold that would allow cable companies to charge customers a late fee of up to $5.
Brunsvold and other legislators repeatedly praised the measure as “consumer friendly” since it laid out a series of procedures that cable firms must follow before they could collect the fee.
But they did not mention that by formally establishing that a $5 late fee was “valid and reasonable” in the state’s statute books, lawmakers would also derail an investigation and potential litigation by Atty. Gen. Jim Ryan challenging the fairness of such a fee.
In the aftermath of that 78-34 House vote, a political firestorm has erupted.
The Senate has agreed to defer action on the bill until public hearings are held. Several House members want to reconsider the vote on the measure. The state’s congressional delegation has weighed in, asking Senate President James “Pate” Philip (R-Wood Dale) to oppose the legislation. And self-styled consumer groups are proposing a lower cap on late fees.
Ryan, who will formally announce his re-election bid for attorney general Monday, returned a $2,000 check from the cable association that he received in the mail Friday, which had been solicited long before the current brouhaha.
But the story of how the legislation was passed by the House with almost unprecedented swiftness symbolizes the growing influence of the cable industry in Illinois in recent years.
Moreover, it is another example of how a pay-for-play philosophy helps dictate the decisions made in the Statehouse, where some well-placed cash provides special interests with access to the legislative leadership and rank-and-file lawmakers as well.
Records show the industry contributed almost $400,000 to the state’s four legislative leaders, their fundraising committees and rank-and-file lawmakers from January 1995, through their 1996 re-election campaigns and up to July 1 of this year.
Of that amount, the industry donated $198,448 directly to the four leaders of the House and Senate–Speaker Madigan, President Philip, House GOP leader Lee Daniels of Elmhurst and Senate Democratic leader Emil Jones Jr. of Chicago–and to the leadership funds they control.
Together they are known as “The Four Tops” and they are the ones who set the public policy agenda in the state Capitol, using their leadership funds to amass power, advance bills of their choosing and sway the votes of recalcitrant legislators.
But the industry also sent another $189,647 directly to rank-and-file lawmakers. All told, 102 of the state’s 177 representatives and senators got a direct cash calling card from the cable industry.
Like other special-interest groups who dole out donations to politicians, the cable industry views it not just as a cost of doing business, but a vital function of government involvement.
“You have to believe that (making a campaign contribution) is a legitimate part of democracy and the political process. The fundraising exists. The golf outings exist. The need for campaign revenues exist. If all those exist and they are legal and proper and you follow the law, you participate,” said Gary J. Maher, executive director of the Cable Television & Communications Association of Illinois.
“I don’t consider our levels to be big. I think it’s a matter of being effective. I think we’ve done our job,” Maher said. “We are supportive of good legislators who give us the opportunity to make our case. That’s how we base our contributions.”
Certainly, the cable industry’s contributions pale in comparison to those of the largest special interest groups, such as the Illinois State Medical Society and the Illinois Education Association, which regularly dole out contributions to influence public policy in a state where there is no limit on campaign donations.
The medical society, the state’s physician lobby, spent more than $1.4 million on campaign contributions during the 1995-96 campaign period, just ahead of the IEA, one of the state’s two major teachers unions, which passed around $1.2 million worth of cash and services. That compares with $317,513 donated by the Cable Television & Communications Association PAC during that time.
The campaign contributions from the cable industry and those of other special interest groups were examined by the Tribune from a database compiled by the Center for Public Integrity. The Washington-based non-profit, non-partisan research group collected records of more than 88,000 separate contributions and 23,000 expenditures filed with the State Board of Elections.
The cable industry’s lobbying in the Statehouse has grown as the industry itself has expanded into millions of homes.
Concerned at the start with establishing franchise agreements with local governments for the right to bring coaxial cable into homes, the association’s political action committee had only $2,683 in the bank when it was formally restructured a dozen years ago.
As recently as 1994, when all statewide offices were up for election as well as political control of the Illinois House and Senate, the association spent less than $95,000–a pittance in a high-stakes political game of campaign finance and influence driven by special interests.
But that same year, the association became engaged in the massive rewriting of the state’s telecommunications laws. And a year later, putting cable into a home was no longer an issue for the industry. Instead, it became a matter of which cable company would be used.
Faced with the threat of competition, Ameritech and the cable industry engaged in a lengthy and costly struggle over the procedures for how a city could approve a competing cable franchise. That battle didn’t end until this spring with the passage of a compromise bill to level the regulatory playing field for an existing cable franchise and a competitor.
More than just competing for customers, Ameritech and the cable industry also competed for a sympathetic ear. From 1995 to 1996, Ameritech and the cable association contributed more than $700,000 to Illinois politicians.
Also during that two-year period, the cable association reported it spent $48,262 in directly lobbying lawmakers.
The big event was April 25, 1995, the association’s annual legislative lobby day.
It flew singer-actress Shirley Jones of “Partridge Family” fame to Springfield, shelled out another $6,300 for cocktails and appetizers and handed out $12,000 worth of stuffed dolls from the Disney Channel, baseball caps from the Arts & Entertainment Network, videotapes from HBO, pens from Showtime and memo pads from CLTV, the Tribune Co.’s cable news operation.
Various Tribune broadcasting outlets have been contributors to the cable association’s political action committee, as have virtually all of the companies behind the acronyms that fill a daily television schedule, including MTV Networks, USA Network, ESPN, TBS and AMC.
But the interests of television programmers in the cable association are secondary to those of the 20 cable companies that control the distribution and billing for that programming into homes and high-rises across the state.
Over the years, the association also has enlisted a group of high-profile lobbyists to carry its message to lawmakers, including current Cook County Assessor James Houlihan. Houlihan, who no longer lobbies, later switched sides to work on behalf of Ameritech against the cable association.
The association also retained lobbying firms headed by former state Reps. Alfred G. Ronan and Paul Williams. All told, the clients that Ronan and Williams represent contributed more than $3 million to lawmakers from 1995 to 1996. That cash-backed clout gives them a great deal of access in which to pitch any one of their client’s wishes to legislators.
Ultimately, it was the resolution of cable’s battle with Ameritech in the spring of this year that gave the industry an opportunity to address what had become a nagging concern–late fees.
While state law regulates what utilities can charge and federal laws cover the financial industry, others are limited to a generic standard of what is “valid and reasonable” to cover actual business costs.
Ryan’s investigation is an effort to determine whether cable operators are actually covering the cost of doing business with a delinquent subscriber or padding their profits.
Commonwealth Edison, for example, is limited to charging 1.5 percent of the amount owed as a late fee. But with a monthly cost of basic cable service in Chicago of about $13, a $5 late-fee would represent a 38.5 percent penalty.
In Baltimore, a judge in September knocked down a $5 late fee used by United Cable Television to 50 cents and ordered $5.4 million in refunds. The Illinois attorney general’s office is conducting a consumer fraud investigation of cable fees, as is Chicago. Class-action suits against cable operators in Chicago, similar to the case in Baltimore, also have been filed.
“The assumption that we went to the veto session to sneak something through is wrong,” Maher said. “As a result of the severity of the issue . . . we needed, in essence, an emergency solution to this, and the time to go is when the legislature is in session.”
With Madigan’s and Daniels’ support, the industry-written measure was proposed as an amendment on a bill that had originally dealt with stormwater management in the East St. Louis area. The amendment effectively removed any reference to stormwater and substituted language on cable late fees.
In a matter of 5 hours, the proposal advanced from the House Local Government Committee and the House Rules Committee, which is tightly controlled by the leadership, and went directly to the floor.
It received 78 votes, 7 more than needed to make such a law take effect immediately.
Those House lawmakers who voted for the bill and are now seeking to have it reconsidered, said their staffs did not provide them with an analysis of the measure. Instead, they looked at the dual voting boards on each side of the chamber, where the measure was still labeled as dealing with “Stormwater Management-Control” even though that portion of it was deleted. And they relied on the floor debate.
On the House floor, addressing Brunsvold and his colleagues, Republican Rep. Tom Cross of Yorkville said: “I guess my point, and I don’t want to belabor it, Joel, is that this is a bill that protects and gives notice to consumers and that it’s a good reason to be supportive of this bill.”
“Absolutely,” Brunsvold responded. “This is actually going to strengthen the customer’s position so that he is not overcharged on late fees.”
Comments like those now have lawmakers fighting among themselves.
“I do not blame the cable industry or private interests for trying to persuade the legislature that their private interest is a public good,” said Rep. Judy Erwin (D-Chicago).
“But the legislature’s job is not to just be a pawn of private interests. The real problem with this bill was the apparent deception by the sponsors in not telling the whole story.”
Rep. Sara Feigenholtz (D-Chicago) acknowledged she hadn’t read the bill but voted for it based on the comments of Republican and Democratic speakers in debate.
“When you hear things like, `This is a pro-consumer bill’ and `This is good for consumers,’ you have a tendency, when you hear it coming from both (Democratic and Republican) sides of the aisle, to believe it’s true,” she said.
But Maher maintains that the legislation is a “tough pro-consumer bill” that puts stringent restrictions on how cable firms can impose late fees.
“We can’t impose a cable late fee prior to 30 days past the due date without notification. In the average instance, that’s 40 days to pay your cable bill. And, you have to get written notice 10 days prior to being assessed the late fee.”
Still, the leadership knew that the measure was likely to cause controversy for some lawmakers and their constituents.
Madigan and Daniels got the word out to those legislators who are known as “targets”–because they are being targeted for defeat in next year’s election–to vote against the measure.
“What is so infuriating to me is that no one (from leadership) says anything, except that they thought it was so damning (an issue) to ensure that every single target is a `no’ vote,” said one lawmaker who asked not to be identified.
But Brunsvold said those lawmakers who are having second thoughts are revising the history of why the bill passed.
“I went through the provisions of the bill, and I said it was a good bill. How deceptive can that be? I lined it out for them almost word for word. To say this is a pro-consumer bill is absolutely true,” he said.
“To me, a $5 maximum is not unreasonable. If you don’t want to pay a $5 late fee, don’t be late. And if you can’t afford cable, maybe you shouldn’t have it,” he said.
