BLOOMBERG 2004 LOBBYIST/SAFFERS

Bloomberg has three staffers that were either former lobbyists or currently lobby. In addition to that, two staffers from his 2001 campaign became lobbyists.

From the 2001 campaign, Maureen Connelly and Kathleen Cudahy, have been retained by clients to lobby his administration. Ms. Connelly and Ms. Cudahy work for the same firm, Tenth on the list was Connelly McLaughlin Communications, which was ranked 10th on the list of the highest earning lobbying firms in NYC this year (1). When asked if he would request his former campaign consultants to refrain from lobbying, he replied ''I'd be happy to do that.'' But within hours, the mayor's office was backing away, insisting that what Mr. Bloomberg had said was not really what he meant. ''The mayor doesn't think it is necessary to make that request,'' Ed Skyler, the mayor's spokesman, said (2).

On the 2005 campaign Bill Cunningham and Josh Isay have been lobbyists.

Bill Cunningham, Bloomberg's chief campaign consultant, was Senior VP of Public Policy at Fleet bank, some time between 1995 and 2001. Prior to his job as lobbyist, he was a senior staff member for both Governor Hugh Carey and Governor Mario Cuomo, he was Deputy Commissioner of the New York State Department of Transportation and Assistant Director of Economic Development at the New York State Commerce Department. Cunningham served as Chief of Staff for Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan in 1995. He first went to work for Bloomberg in 2001 for his first campaign.

Josh Isay was Director of Public Policy and Government Affairs for DoubleClick between 2000 and 2001 (3). But according to the Industry Standard, Isay was still with Doubleclick in May 2001 - while he was working on Alan Hevesi's 2001 campaign for mayor (4). Doubleclick, a leading internet ad company, was under investigation - over privacy issues - by the FTC while Isay lobbied for them (5). They settled a 30 month long investigation with Attorneys General from 10 states for $450,000 and agreed to implement safeguards in August of 2002 (6). Doubleclick settled a private class-action lawsuit with $1.8 million earlier that year (7). Doubleclick purchased Abacus Direct, a marketing company, and planned to merge the names from Abacus's offline data with its anonymous online user activity, but backed down due to bad publicity (8). Additionally, Isay is a partner at the political consulting firm Isay, Klores, Prince - which has an address at Reed Smith, LLP (9), a firm with major national lobbying operations. Before Doubleclick, Isay was chief of staff to Senator Charles Schumer, was campaign manager for Andrew Cuomo's failed 2002 gubernatorial bid, and worked on Democrat Robert Torricelli's successful U.S. Senate campaign. He turned down a top post in Al Gore's presidential campaign, Hillary Clinton's Senate bid, and a job offer to run the Democratic Senators Campaign Committee to lobby for Doubleclick.

On a related side-note regarding personal information, the Bloomberg campaign has spent over $5 million on a voter database. It is paying Penn, Schoen, and Berland Associates to combine formatted voter information from the Board of elections with answers to a survey conducted by phone (10).

Kevin Sheekey, political advisor to the mayor, became a lobbyist for Bloomberg, LLP in 1997. Prior to his affiliation with Bloomberg, Sheekey was Chief of Staff to Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan.










(1) The New York Times, May 26, 2005, City Lobbyists' Earnings Double To $33.6 Million in Five Years, MIKE McINTIRE
(2)The New York Times, June 9, 2004, Mayor Retreats on Restricting Consultants From Lobbying, Mike Mcintire
(3) Daily News, January 4, 2001, DOUBLECLICK LOBBYIST HEADS BACK TO POLITICS, JOEL SIEGEL
(4) The Industry Standard, May 28, 2001, Singing the K Street Blues, Aaron Pressman
(5) The New York Post, March 7, 2000, DOUBLECLICK BEEFS UP POLITICAL CONNECTIONS, MARY HUHN
(6) Doubleclick Press Release, August 26, 2002
(7)The Washington Post, August 27, 2002, Web Ad Firm to Limit Use of Profiles, Robert O'Harrow Jr.
(8) The New York Post, March 7, 2000, DOUBLECLICK BEEFS UP POLITICAL CONNECTIONS, Mary Huhn
(9) New York Department of State Corporation filing
(10) The New York Sun, June 20, 2005, Bloomberg Camp Spends Millions On Voter Data, JULIA LEVY