Aurora City Council member Angela Lawson is sponsoring an ordinance to create lobbyist registration and reporting requirements.

Lawson’s sweeping proposals would require lobbyists to register their clients and income with the city and submit quarterly, detailed reports on their activities and financial motivations.

Lobbyists who do not comply with the regulations could lose the ability to influence city officials on matters from development to zoning rules, permits and city contracts, face possible expulsion and up to $2,500 fines per charge.

The rules would apply not only to lobbyists and the City Council but also to the city manager, staff, board and commission members, and presiding judges, among others. The city clerk would be responsible for deciding if rules have been violated and handing down judgments.

City Council members will review the proposal during their next regular meeting on March 8.

The Kentucky Executive Branch Ethics Commission passed an emergency regulation and provided guidance on a passed bill.

This bill passed amends registration requirements for executive agency lobbying.

Effective July 1, Senate Bill 157 requires the initial registration statement to include compensation paid to, or received by, each executive agency lobbyist, employer, and real party in interest as part of the engagement.

The emergency regulation provides the procedures for filing lobbyist forms and includes changes to the lobbyist forms.

In addition, electronic fillable forms and instructions will be posted on the commission’s website soon.

In the regular reminder notices, the new forms and revisions will also be addressed.

Each lobbyist, employer and real party in interest receives these notices.

All initial registration and updated registration statements must now be submitted using the 2020 revised forms.

Additionally, a credit card payment app will be available starting July 1.

The commission also extended the filing period deadline for the required updated registration filing forms and registration fee payment from July 31 to August 31 due to COVID-19.

The Cuyahoga County Council recently updated the county’s code of ethics to clarify the ethical rights, responsibilities, and prohibitions applicable to elected officials, employees, board members, contractors, and lobbyists.

New provisions include, but are not limited to, a new lobbyist registration threshold, a new lobbyist reporting requirement, updated gift rules with a presumption of influence standard, and a lower monetary contract threshold for contractor registration and ethics training.

A summary of the changes to the ethics laws and a copy of the ordinance are available for review on the county inspector general’s website. The ordinance became effective May 27.

California Governor Jerry Brown has signed senate bill 398 into law. The bill alters definitions and reporting requirements for those who do business with the board of a public pension or retirement system to manage securities or other assets and went into effect upon signature.

Specifically, the new law modifies the definition of external managers to mean a person who is seeking to be, or is, retained by a board or an investment vehicle to manage a portfolio of securities or other assets for compensation, or a person who manages an investment fund, and who offers or sells, or has offered or sold an ownership interest in the investment fund to a board or investment vehicle. The law also alters the definition of a placement agent to a person directly or indirectly hired, engaged, or retained by, or serving for the benefit of or on behalf of, an external manger and who acts or has acted for compensation as a finder, solicitor, marketer, consultant, broker, or other intermediary in connection with the offer or sale to a board or investment vehicle either the investment management services of the external manager or an ownership interest in an investment fund managed by the external manager.

Additional changes made as the result of the new law include the exemption of placement agents from any requirements imposed by a local government agency, including lobbyist registration and reporting, if the placement agent is an employee, officer, or director of an external manager, or of an affiliate of an external manager, and the external manager is registered as an investment adviser or a broker-dealer with the Securities and Exchange Commission or any state securities regulator. Further, placement agents are exempt from local requirements if the external manager is participating in a competitive bidding process, such as a request for proposal, or has been selected through a competitive bidding process and is providing services pursuant to a contract executed as a result of that bidding process, or when the external manager, if selected through competitive bidding, has agreed to a fiduciary standard of care for the contract.