Details about this story

• Source: Chattanooga Times Free Press
• Date: November 25, 2006
• URL: Read the story
• Bylines: Dave Flessner , Pam Sohn
• Topics: Lobbying
• Data Types: FOIA , Paper Trail
• Description/Excerpt: Taxpayers across Tennessee spent more than $8.6 million in the past three years to pay for local governments to lobby state and federal officials, according to reports provided to the Chattanooga Times Free Press. Until October of this year, groups hiring lobbyists were not required to report their activities or the cost of the lobbying. The Times Free Press obtained these 2003-05 reports by filing Freedom of Information Act requests with the governments named as clients by lobbyists registered with the Tennessee Registry of Election Finance, which oversaw the registrations until the state's new ethics rules for lobbyists took effect last month. The paper sent out 58 freedom of information requests and obtained information on 44 public bodies, as well as 42 lobbyists.