Disclosure Often Spotty or Inaccurate

By FREDRIC N. TULSKY and JOHN SULLIVAN

 

Public officials who are lobbyists routinely defend decisions to play both roles by saying they disclose their relationships publicly, as the law requires.

 

But the disclosure rules and practices in Illinois leave room for lobbyists to operate without public notice, leaving room for conflicts of interest, according to statements of economic interests of public officials, lobbying registrations filed with the City of Chicago, Cook County and the state, and records of state bills and local ordinances examined by Medill Watchdog, a journalism program at Northwestern University.