State and Federal Communications, Inc. is home to the one-and-only News You Can Use digest and its accompanying daily newsletter, LobbyComply News Roundup. For 23 years, Jim Sedor, Manager of News Services, has been providing this award-winning news service to clients and followers.

Jim started his career by earning a Bachelor’s degree in Social Sciences at Edinboro University and later attending graduate school for Library Information Science at Kent State University. In 2000, Jim came across an ad in the Akron Beacon Journal to be the first Manager of News Services at State and Federal Communications, Inc. He has been here ever since.

“This job had just been created when I applied for it and got it, so I’ve been able to sort of shape how it’s done, which has been satisfying. It started out as an in-house report so we could show our seven or eight employees at the time what was going on,” Jim explained.

What began in-house evolved into daily newsletters and a weekly e-mail digest that gets sent to hundreds of recipients. Additionally, State and Federal Communications, Inc. received the Outstanding Service Award from the Council of Governmental Ethics Laws in 2020 primarily because of News You Can Use.

“We couldn’t have done this before the internet because that’s where I do all the research. Then we saw there was so much information that our clients and others would need to know or would want to know about. So it’s just grown as the company has grown,” he said.

Jim’s contributions have been invaluable to our Research and Compliance departments, as well as the Marketing and Sales teams.

“If a court decision comes up or if a governor signs a new law that we need to know about because it affects lobbying or campaign finance, I’m able to alert them, send out information, so that we keep up-to-date,  don’t miss anything, and everything is updated  in a timely manner.”

When it comes to helping our clients, Jim provides a unique and invaluable product. When he meets clients and industry experts at events like the Annual COGEL Conference, he’s able to hear from them about what issues they are seeing, problems they may be having, and solutions that are being considered.

“And after 23 years, I think that’s given me some gravitas,” he said.

Jim’s contributions don’t only provide up-to-date information and the latest news, however. Through the LobbyComply News Roundup and News You Can Use, government affairs professionals can also understand why compliance is so important.

“Big companies realize they need to know the law before they act, and that’s where State and Federal comes in, because we know the fine points of the law and we can alert them when they’re running into problems and how to avoid having their company name in a headline,” he explained.