PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – Large corporations are the main source of funding for the nonprofit Senate Presidents’ Forum but the companies’ employees do not use their access at its events to influence public officials, according to Charlie Fogarty, the Rhode Island Senate’s former president pro tempore.
“There were a lot of national corporations who were sponsors, as they are at virtually every organization from the National Governors Association right down to the National Conference of State Legislatures,” Fogarty, who served on the board of the Senate Presidents’ Forum during the late 1990s, told WPRI.com.
The Princeton, N.J.-based nonprofit has been in the news since The Providence Journal revealed that Senate Majority Leader Dominick Ruggerio missed the start of the special pension session in October because the organization was paying for him to attend one of its events in Buenos Aires. Its website is no longer accessible.
The Senate Presidents’ Forum raised $3.4 million in contributions and grants from 2005 through 2009, according to its most recent IRS filing. The group provided no details about the sources of its funding. It listed no employees but said it paid $110,000 to Rose Swan, a consultant in Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y., in 2009.
“Any type of government organization has some type of corporate sponsorship which folks pay to join,” Fogarty said, citing similar situations at groups such as the National Lieutenant Governors Association and the National Association of State Budget Officers.
Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed, Ruggerio and Senate Majority Leader Maryellen Goodwin are attending an event the Senate Presidents’ Forum is hosting this weekend in Key West, Fla., The Journal reported Thursday. Fogarty said he has “the highest regard” for Paiva Weed and said attending the event will benefit the trio.
Fogarty said events of that nature offered the chance “to learn more about issues, exchange ideas, get best practices, talk about common challenges and ways to deal with them – it made you, ultimately, a better legislator.” He recalled attending panel discussions on issues such as health care and the environment at the forum’s events.
The names of the corporate sponsors of the Senate Presidents’ Forum were listed on the name-tags of their representatives at its social events, Fogarty said. “I never recall a time where anybody talked about anything about business specifically,” he said. “If anything, if they weren’t in Rhode Island we might have asked them to consider expanding in Rhode Island – so we could have the opportunity to tout bringing that company to their state.”
Fogarty, who now leads the Department of Labor and Training, said he asked Providence-based GTECH to contribute to the National Lieutenant Governors Association when he led that organization but did not recall ever being asked to raise money for the Senate Presidents’ Forum when he was on its board.
“There are always going to be folks that don’t believe in any kind of travel or event like this, and they certainly can have their opinion on that,” he said. “But I found the exchange of ideas very instructive, because you learn a lot,” particularly about how “to deliver services in a better way.”
(photo: senpf.org)
Tags: charlie fogarty, dominick ruggerio, general assembly, m. teresa paiva weed, senate, senate presidents’ forum, state government
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