The people who may soon have to publicly report a lot more about their activities.
Lobbyists who try to influence Mayor Mike Johnston’s administration or City Council members are currently required to register only their names and their clients. But how much they’re being paid, whom they’re lobbying, and what issue they’re supporting or opposing remain totally unsaid in the city’s registry.
That would all change under a proposal the council began considering last week. Besides requiring more detailed disclosures about lobbying activity, the measure would create a “cooling-off period” for former elected officials who want to become lobbyists.
Across Civic Center, monthly disclosures for lobbyists, including who their clients are, how much they are paid, which bills or subjects they are lobbying on, and their positions on those matters.
Denver Clerk and Recorder Paul López’s office is partnering with Councilwomen Jamie Torres, Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez and Shontel Lewis on the legislation. They proposed the changes in response to a shift in the way policy has progressed in the city in recent years.
“We’re seeing a different level of lobbying taking place in our current political climate, and we can’t be behind the ball and not be able to be transparent with the public and the media about whatap happening,” Torres said during .
Lobbying became a recent flashpoint in Denver politics after the city’s Department of Transportation and Infrastructure altered a project design last year to reduce the number of lanes along a portion of Alameda Avenue. It late came to light that Denver officials had changed the plan after a lobbyist — and former city employee — had contacted the city on behalf of Jill Anschutz, the daughter-in-law of billionaire Phil Anschutz.
The revelation prompted criticism from transit and street safety advocates, who said the kerfuffle demonstrated how wealth influenced city politics. Johnston has insisted that the pivot came from the engineering experts inside DOTI.
Some of the council’s most controversial topics, like pushing the repeal of a ban on pit bills and a ban on flavored tobacco, didn’t produce any lobbying reports despite council members clearly being lobbied heavily, Torres said.
“None of them have garnered lobbying activity in the reports, as of yet, because of the way that the law is written,” Torres said.
The new regulations, which would take effect in 2027, would require lobbyists to report details on their work every two months.
“There is a need for reporters and the public, and even the officials themselves, to understand what interests are taking aim at Denver policies,” said Aly Belknap, the executive director of Colorado Common Cause, a government watchdog group. “It gives everybody a better footing of where power lives.”
Impact on grassroots campaigns
Organizations that engage in “grassroots lobbying,” including by asking residents to email specific council members and ask them to vote a certain way, would also fall under the requirements.
The regulations would include new ways of enforcing the lobbying rules. If a lobbyist doesn’t report activity by a report’s due date, they would incur a small fine. If their nonreporting goes on or what they file appears to be fraudulent in some way, the clerk’s office would be able to refer the case to an independent judge. That person would then have the ability to issue a subpoena or a larger fine — or even ban the person from lobbying the city.
Belknap said she thought the enforcement mechanism would be stronger if penalties were explicitly stated in the law, rather than applied retroactively by a hearing officer.
“I think that might put us on a stronger path to accountability and to avoiding situations where something has risen to the level of needing to go to a hearing,” she said.
Belknap also said she believed the reporting requirements should apply to lobbying activity related to businesses seeking work through the city’s contract solicitation process.
Cooling-off period
The proposed law would restrict elected officials from immediately beginning jobs as lobbyists after they leave office.
A “cooling-off period” is common in other forms of government. In the Colorado legislature, for example, lawmakers must wait at least two years before they can join the lobby. In the U.S. House, the period lasts one year, and in the U.S. Senate it is two years.
The proposal in Denver would require a six-month gap between elected office and lobbying. That’s the same amount of time to a restriction on former city employees from doing work at their next job that takes advantage of the direct action they had exercised in their city role.
The drafters of the proposal intended that lobbying time-out for former officials as a way to prevent elected officials from using the positions and relationships they build in office to improve their future earnings. It is also meant to prevent council members from taking favorable votes for a certain interested party with the promise of working for that firm after they leave office.
Councilwoman Sarah Parady said she believes a six-month period wouldn’t be long enough to be effective.
But Torres said that based on her conversations with other council members, Parady was in the minority on that point.
The mayor’s cabinet would also fall under the cooling-off period requirements.
More details on proposal
Under the measure, lobbyists would have to report when they meet with elected officials like council members or the mayor, or with people in their offices, as well as people the officials have appointed to policy-making or advising positions.
They wouldn’t have to report casual meetings or conversations. But if a lobbyist asks the person to support or oppose a specific piece of legislation, they must report it. All of the reporting requirements would fall on the lobbyist, rather than on the official they’re contacting.
The proposal considers anyone who is paid at least $1,000 to engage in lobbying to be a lobbyist. A volunteer lobbyist or individual residents who represent their own interests would be exempt.
The full council is set to consider the bill on its first reading on June 1.
