Just days before Lockheed Martin donated $100,000 to a charity run by state Sen. Tom Wiens, the Castle Rock Republican introduced a bill that directed the state to spend millions to buy commercial satellite service.
At the time, one of the most prominent players in that business was Space Imaging, a Thornton-based company jointly owned by defense contractors Lockheed Martin and Raytheon Systems.
Both Wiens and Lockheed said Thursday that there was no connection between the contribution and the legislation.
“That had nothing to do with it,” Wiens said. “I didn’t even know Space Imaging was owned by Lockheed.”
Wiens’ bill wanted the governor’s office to provide “adequate funding” to the state forest service to buy space-based satellite imagery to detect wildfires.
Lockheed Martin spokeswoman Joan Underwood said that the company was unaware of the legislation and that the contribution was not connected.
On May 3, 2004, Lockheed Martin announced that it was donating $100,000 to the Stand in the Gap Project, a nonprofit corporation Wiens created in January 2004 to help financially troubled military families.
“This contribution was completely consistent with Lockheed Martin’s long-standing practice of providing support to members of the armed forces and their families,” Underwood said.
Stand in the Gap Project has been under scrutiny because Wiens, president of the organization, had failed to file the required annual report to the Internal Revenue Service.
After questions from reporters, Wiens released the filing, showing that the group collected $119,336, but passed only $54,472 to needy families.
In October 2005, Wiens reported to Lockheed Martin that his group had raised a total $142,395 and had spent $42,498 on salaries and $28,120 on administrative expenses. Earlier this week, a Lockheed spokeswoman said the company doesn’t monitor its donations to see how the money is spent.
Underwood said the company does not expect quid-pro- quo arrangements for its donations.
Lockheed Martin, which reported $37.2 billion in sales in 2005, makes many charitable contributions each year. The same month that Lockheed gave $100,000 to Wiens’ group, the company gave $100,000 to the nonprofit National Science Center of Augusta, Ga., and $123,000 worth of computer equipment to Falcon School District 49 in Colorado Springs.
On April 27, 2004, just a few days before the donation was made to Stand in the Gap, Wiens secured permission from statehouse leaders to introduce a late bill, House Bill 1459, to address issues related to fighting wildfires.
Specifically, the bill would have required the governor’s office to “make it a priority to provide funding to access and utilize commercial, high-resolution, space-based satellite imaging for specified purposes related to wildfire prevention, fighting and monitoring.”
The bill won bipartisan support – including co-sponsorship from current House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, D-Denver, and Senate President Joan Fitz-Gerald, D-Jefferson County.
Wiens said he learned that such satellite-based pictures were critical for fighting fires during the Hayman fire in 2002. He said his ranch was a staging site for firefighters.
Wiens said he knew of two companies that provide such images: Space Imaging and DigitalGlobe, a privately owned company based in Longmont. Wiens said he was unaware of any connection between Space Imaging and Lockheed Martin.
Lockheed and Raytheon were the original investors in Space Imaging when it was incorporated in 1994, said Mark Brender, spokesman for GeoEye, the Dulles, Va., company that acquired Space Imaging in January.
Wiens said he killed his own bill when state officials estimated it would cost $400 million. That’s because officials calculated what it would cost the state to send a satellite into space.
Wiens said the estimate – known as a fiscal note – was a sign that his bill had no chance of passing in a year when budget constraints were forcing lawmakers to cut millions from other programs. “The fiscal note showed a real lack of interest,” he said.
Skip Edel, the Colorado State Forest Service’s expert on satellite-based imagery, said commercial services aren’t very helpful.
“They don’t do well on monitoring active fires,” Edel said. “They don’t see through smoke.”
Staff writer Mark P. Couch can be reached at 303-820-1794 or mcouch@denverpost.com.
