REXANO Lobby 101 or,How I learned to stop worrying and love lobbying Tim Stoffel

Lobby 101

or,

How I learned to stop worrying and love lobbying

By Tim Stoffel, February 18, 2009

Nevada is lucky in many ways. The State is well known for the freedom people have here to live their lives without a lot of conditions and rules. Gambling is legal here 24/7. Brothels are legal here 24/7. Bars are open around the clock. The speed limits are high, and the roads wide open. And all sorts of animal people live here, simply because one can own animals here. Almost all species of felines may be owned here without any kind of permit. As a result of this freedom the State's residents enjoy, they got the State Constitution modified to have the Legislature meet only every other year, for just 120 days. This keeps lawmakers concentrating on laws we really need, and not on silly, extraneous legislation (although they still try and introduce it!).

Animal regulation bills here have historically been few and far between, and easily defeated. But with the current power structure in Government at all levels having shifted heavily to the liberal side, it has opened the door wide open for the liberal-friendly animal rights people to start aggressively pursuing their agenda.

So, when I heard that the Humane Society of the US (HSUS) had planned to hold a 'legislative day' here in Nevada, I knew it was time that the animal owners in the state needed to do something. We could not just sit back and let this group fill our lawmaker's heads with toxic ideas. So, I decided that this might be the time to become proactive. I also lived close enough to the State Capitol, Carson City, that it was easy to visit the Legislature even on casual business.

I first contacted the people I knew in the State who might be most interested in doing this. Among these were Deeanna Croasmun, the Nevada State Field Representative for the Feline Conservation Federation. I also contacted Zuzana Kukol and Scott Shoemaker of REXANO. Ken Sondej, who maintains the NevadaPetLaw email list was also contacted. He could not participate, but he contacted people who could. None of the others initially asked, responded.

As luck would have it, a group of local Conservative Republicans were hosting a training seminar to teach people how to be effective in lobbying our Government officials at the grassroots level. Although it was a financial hardship at the time, I am really glad I took the time and money to participate. There was a 'lobbyists tour of the capitol', a tour where we were not only shown around the seat of power of our State Government, but where to find the resources needed for effectively lobbying lawmakers. (We were treated to a very informative visit with a Supreme Court Justice. We also visited the Governor, who surprised us a very frank and 'down to earth' discussion on our State's budget problems, and why he took the approach he did to try and solve it.) The next day of the seminar was a series of workshops on everything from how the media works to how to run for political office. As part of this, I was able to spend some quality time with well known ex Assemblywoman Sharron Angle, who gave me all sorts of useful advice on how to conduct our lobby day.

The two most important things I learned from Sharron were 1.) Be proactive. Don't meet with lawmakers the day of the HSUS presentation, but before. 2.) Make appointments to meet with lawmakers, don't just try and catch them. Based on this information, I set our 'legislative day' to be Monday, February 9th, three days before HSUS descended on the legislature on the 12th.

With a date finally set, we finalized on the makeup of our 'lobby team'. It was to consist of Zuzana Kukol and Scott Shoemaker from REXANO, as well as Deeanna Croasmun. At that point, invitations for meetings went out to every member of the Nevada State Legislature. And the very next day, I started getting both calls and emails to set appointments with lawmakers. We were off to a good start!

Now the challenges began. We needed literature to give to the lawmakers. I tried to work on this, but my job kept getting in the way. I am a television engineer, and we have this thing called the 'analog shutoff' coming on the 17th of February. I have been working a lot of odd hours to make sure our digital services are ready for this change. But one advantage of this is I am getting an odd day off here and there. And Friday before 'Legislative Day' was one of those days. I used that day to go down to the Capitol and register as a lobbyist. The process, at least here in Nevada, is simple, and went easier than I had been led to believe. I was then able to relate to the other participants as to what to expect. Lesson here: Make sure you know in advance what is required to be a lobbyist in your state. I am glad I got this done, as I ended up being involved with another unrelated training seminar on Saturday that went much later than planned.

Meanwhile, courtesy of some random catches on email, and working with Ken Sondej, I was able to 'land' one more participant, and a couple more for future events. The person who would join our team was Christine Vaught, who is a dog trainer. Chris, as she likes to be called, is also experienced as a lobbyist, and her experience showed in Carson City.

Because of being tied up all day Saturday, I ended up having to give up my Sunday 'kitty time' at the zoo to give me more time to work on literature. At least, I had my three 'little lions' (domestics) to 'help' me with the literature. To make matters more interesting, I had to work for several hours Sunday evening (one of the joys and thrills of working in TV!). But after work was done, and with everyone coming into town, we had a meeting scheduled for that evening to get ready for the big day.

It was really good to finally have us all meet face to face. I already knew Zuzana and Scott.

But I had never met Deeanna or Chris. We had a most cordial meeting at a sports bar in Carson City while the snow fell outside. We looked at all the literature that had been prepared. The most important piece of this was a 1 page single fold handout that gave our basic premise as a 'sound bite'. We hoped if the lawmaker read nothing else, they would read this. Another, longer version of this document was prepared, with a lot more information, and links to online resources. Scott had also prepared some CD-ROMS of information from REXANO's website, including some videos. We left that meeting all excited about the next day!

Legislative Day started out much calmer and quieter than I ever expected, but it almost got off to a bad start. I had near-whiteout snow conditions at my house when I left. I did not want to be late due to traffic, so I left plenty early. But luckily, the whiteout was only in my general area just north of Reno. The weather was fine by the time I had made the 35 mile drive to Carson City. I ended up at the Capitol much earlier than anticipated.

We had made 9 advance appointments to visit lawmakers for the day, and would try impromptu visits with others as we had the opportunity. The first of these was very early, at 7:45 AM, which I would take care of alone or with Chris. The rest began a few hours later, corresponding to breaks in the legislative meeting schedule. There were a couple lawmakers we were supposed to try and catch when they were going into, or coming out of, committee meetings. (We never did catch them.) Later in the morning, we planned to all meet for breakfast.

Chris, who is local to Carson City, dropped off the literature she had made copies of. She then had to register as a lobbyist while I handled the first meeting alone. This was with Assemblyman Joe Hogan. Although I did not have butterflies in my stomach or anything like that, (I do a fair amount of public speaking) talking to someone with legislative power about an issue that is minor in most of their eyes, is at first intimidating. But that all quickly disappeared as we got into conversation.

I tried to represent all animal owners in my mini-presentation. I mentioned the HSUS visit later in the week, and then talked about the problems that exist with HSUS. I pointed out the many benefits and value that animals bring to the people of Nevada. Knowing from my speech that I was a big cat person, Mr. Hogan told me about a friend of his that had a lion, and lived in Namibia, Africa. By this time, Chris arrived, and she talked about the same issues, but from a dog owner/breeder's perspective. We kept things reasonably brief, and in all, it was a very successful first meeting.

Chris had to leave for a while, and breakfast wasn't for another couple of hours. So, I went to the 'Lobbyists' lounge' and 'hung out'. There was a TV in there, showing what was going on in one of the hearings. There were computer workstations to use, and I used one to determine which commities a couple of our lawmakers were on. (The Nevada legislature also has a good public wireless Internet service, but I did not use it that day.) There were all sorts of reference materials available to use, including the complete Nevada Revised Statutes. There was also a microwave for heating up your lunch. There were couches, tables, chairs, etc. In short, it was a space to both work in and relax.

Both the Assembly and the Senate publish a daily booklet, with the day's schedule for all the various meetings. All bills being considered that day are listed, as well as the status of each and every bill that has been introduced so far. A second daily journal contains the transcript of the general sessions from the previous days. These materials are very useful for one who is planning their lobbying activities, and I spent a lot of time going through them.

After gathering at a nearby restaurant for breakfast, we returned to the Legislature building and our meetings began in earnest. We went together as a group, five of us. The thing that struck us is how pleasant and cordial everyone we talked to was, even if it seemed that they weren't 100 percent 'on board' with us. We opened a lot of legislative eyes about the hidden dangers of the HSUS and other similar organizations. This told us that we were doing the right thing. At least one lawmaker told us without our asking, that we were indeed approaching this issue the right way.

Around lunchtime, we all posed for pictures in various places. For one picture outside the Legislature, we stopped a passerby to take a picture of us. He agreed, pointing out he was a 'trained amateur' at doing this sort of thing. We all chuckled about this. We thanked him, and he went on his way.

There was about an hour where there were no meetings with lawmakers scheduled. They were all in committee meetings. During this time, we visited as many of their offices (of those with which we did not have an appointment) as we could, and left literature. Although this is not as effective as actually meeting the lawmaker, it is better than nothing.

Then, there was a second round of meetings after the afternoon committee meetings had let out. These proved to be some of the more interesting meetings of the day. One Senator we met with had never heard of PETA! We were able to give her a good education, and left her with lots of resources. (It makes one wonder what these people do in their spare time!) At the same time, we met many lawmakers who hunted, fished, or raised animals for various purposes. They were especially interested in what we had to say. Finally, we met a Assemblyman who turned out to be our 'trained amateur' photographer, David Bobzien. As it turns out, this was an important meeting, as he is a member of the committee that oversees the State's Natural Resources department.

At the end of the day, we spent a few minutes perusing the excellent gift shop in the Legislature. We then all said a hasty 'goodbye' to each other, as Deeanna, Zuzana and Scott had long drives ahead of them. With all the prep work and the session, I was so tired I had to stop and do some shopping on the way home to stay awake!

Was this operation a success? Absolutely! Despite only being able to meet with about 15 percent of all the legislature members, we feel that we were able to make a definite difference. As I am writing this, I have learned that legislation was introduced in response to the HSUS visit. Unfortunately for us, it was introduced by a Senator we were unable to get an appointment with. Now, we will keep an eye out for hearings on the legislation (regarding animal fighting and dog tethering) and show up in force. We have set up a communications network so we can all stay in touch with each other. We will continue to recruit new participants. Some participants have already suggested doing another legislative day. There are now enough local-to-Carson-City people interested that we might just be able to do this if we need to.

There is definitely room for improvement. We need to make our appointments with lawmakers earlier than we did to get good meeting times. We also need to deal better with lawmakers who have such chaotic schedules, that they can only be met with going into or out of meetings.

In the end, I hope this account of our experience will help dispel any doubt in your mind that you can do the same thing in your state. And I strongly encourage you to do so. The animal rights people are growing bolder every day, and therefore we need to grow bolder, too. I suspect that Nevada's legislature is not that much different from the legislatures in your state.

Feel free to contact me at tim@lionlamb.us if you have any questions. Go get 'em for the cats (and whatever your animals are)!