Loss of state jobs, cuts for agencies don't deter legislators and lobbyists

In the days after the Missouri House passed an austere budget calling for workers to lose jobs, agencies to make cuts, and schools to lose teachers and funding, it was business as usual for some state legislators and lobbyists.

Documents posted  today on the Missouri Ethics Commission website show lobbyists paying for golf outings, trips to the Indianapolis 500, St. Louis Cardinals baseball games, Cinco De Mayo parties and the James Taylor/Carole King concert at the Sprint Center in Kansas City.

A session that began with much talk about ethics reform ended with many legislators gladly accepting freebies from special interests.

The month of May ended with two legislators, accepting tickets to the Indy 500, as well as lodging and meals, according to the disclosure reports.

Mike Talboy, a Democrat, and Ryan Silvey, a Republican, both from Kansas City, accepted $110.62 worth of meals, $85 Indianapolis 500 tickets, and $266.90 for a hotel stay, from lobbyists Daniel O'Neill and Joseph Pierle, representing the Missouri Primary Care Association.

On May 24, AT&T lobbyist John R. Sondag paid the $100 fees for seven representatives, John Diehl, Town & Country; Doug Funderburk, St. Peter's, Timothy Jones, Eureka, Cole McNary, Chesterfield; Mark Parkinson, St. Charles; Mike Parson,, Bolivar; and Dwight Scharnhorst, Manchester; and two senators, Kevin Engler, Farmington; and Eric Schmitt, St. Louis County, all Republicans, for the AT&T Customer Invitational. I would be curious to know how many "customers" received the same treatment.

The ever-generous Mr. Sondag and AT&T also footed the bill for food and drinks at Cinco De Mayo parties for Democrats Kate Meiners, Kansas City; Michael Spreng, Florissant; and Michael Vogt, St. Louis.

 For Paul LeVota, D-Independence, it was two tickets worth $105 apiece to the James Taylor/Carole King Troubadour Concert at the Sprint Center May 21 from Sprint lobbyist John Kristan Jones.

Samuel Licklider, representing the Missouri Association of Realtors paid $595 for a DJ for a May 5 caucus meeting for Joplin Republican Marilyn Ruestman.

But the legislator who appeared to be enjoying himself at the most on the lobbyists' dime in May was Dwight Scharnhorst. The Manchester Republican not only played in the AT&T Customer Invitational, but he played in another golf tournament the following day, courtesy of Denise Hasty, Associated General Contractors of St. Louis. Scharnhorst also received Cardinals tickets from Christopher Pickel, AT&T and Stephen Hoven, SSM Health Care.

For many Missourians, those who are out of work, those who have had to take pay cuts, those who find themselves working at jobs that pay far less than the ones they used to hold, it is a struggle to survive day-to-day, paying the bills, covering medical costs, and remembering a time when we believed that in America, that hard work is the key to success.

Golf tournaments, concerts, Cinco De Mayo parties, and trips to the Indianapolis 500 are not even things most of us can think about. In January, we heard a great deal of talk from House leadership about the need for ethics reform in the Missouri House of Representatives.

At the end of the day, however, it's just business as usual.