SPN Ties to ALEC

SPN Ties to ALEC is a breakout article from the main article on the State Policy Network (SPN).

Please see the State Policy Network and ALECexposed.org for more.

Below are details of SPN's ties to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC):

SPN's predecessor, the Madison Group, was "launched by the American Legislative Exchange Council or ALEC . . . and housed in the Chicago-based Heartland Institute," according to a 1991 report by the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy (NCRP) found in the University of California-San Francisco's Legacy Tobacco Documents.

The case is strengthened by an October 1987 ALEC directory also available via the Tobacco Documents that says, "The Madison Group is chaired by Mrs. Constance Heckman [now Constance Campanella, founder of the lobbying firm Stateside Associates], Executive Director of ALEC . . ." A speakers list also available in the Tobacco Documents says in Constance Campanella's biography, "She was a co-founder and first President of The Madison Group, the first network of free-market state think tanks."

SPN has been a member of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) for many years. In the mid-2000s, SPN secured funding for more of its member think tanks to join ALEC in order to help develop model legislation. By 2009, 22 SPN member think tanks were active ALEC members and participants in ALEC task forces, according to an SPN newsletter, and SPN was being rewarded for its services by ALEC. As of 2013, at least 36 SPN member think tanks have demonstrable ties to ALEC in addition to SPN's own ties, and all of SPN's member think tanks push ALEC's agenda in their respective states, according to a review by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) (see below for more).

Executive Director Tracie Sharp and staff member Stephen L. Bowen are members of ALEC's Education Task Force; and Sharp and staff members Joe Coletti and Kathleen O'Hearn are members of ALEC's Health and Human Services Task Force.

Randolph J. May, President of Maryland's Free State Foundation, also represents SPN on the Communications and Technology Task Force. At the beginning of the Commerce, Insurance and Economic Development Task Force meeting at the ALEC 2012 Spring Task Force Summit in Charlotte, North Carolina, the meeting started out with "State Policy Network Updates," suggesting that SPN is also a member of that task force.

In addition, SPN has been a "Chairman" or higher level sponsor of ALEC's annual conferences -- which are listed in one of ALEC's funding brochures as costing at least $50,000 per meeting -- in 2013, 2012, and 2010. It also sponsored ALEC's 2012 States & Nation Policy Meeting in Washington, DC. ALEC is also an Associate Member of SPN.

Sharp was the recipient of ALEC's 2009 Private Sector Member of the Year Award. ALEC gave her the award because, according to ALEC "scholar" and founder of SPN member think tank the Evergreen Freedom Foundation, "Not only have SPN members assisted legislators in drafting model legislation, they’ve been key in killing some proposals by ‘rent-seeking’ special interests.”

However, SPN’s tax forms indicate that it does no lobbying.

According to the National Education Association (NEA), "ALEC utilizes the services of the State Policy Network as a clearinghouse to craft model legislation on conservative issues and to provide expert testimony in state capitols once bills are introduced." In addition, it notes, "ALEC and Heritage also serve as a media platform for these state-based think tanks to gain national press attention for research and the legislation and initiatives they introduce."

'''Of SPN's 64 member state think tanks in 2013, at least 36 have demonstrable ties to ALEC in addition to SPN's own ties, and all of SPN's member think tanks push ALEC's agenda in their respective states. Please see SPN Members for more.'''

Follow the Money: SPN Funding to ALEC
SPN’s membership in the controversial organization is not free. Through the years, SPN and its member think tanks have provided ALEC with hundreds of thousands of dollars in membership fees and contributions.

Between 2008 and 2011, SPN and its member think tanks also served as a middleman for effectively funneling money from the secretive Koch-funded Donors Capital Fund to ALEC. In just those four years, the Donors groups itemized $688,800 to SPN and 12 member think tanks for participation in ALEC, task force membership fees, and travel expenses to attend ALEC meetings, where special interest legislation is peddled and lawmakers and their spouses are wined and dined.

From 2007 to 2011, Donors Capital Fund and the related DonorsTrust have funded at least 51 SPN member groups in almost every state for purposes including, but not limited to, participating in ALEC, including giving start-up funds for new franchise-like operations in Arkansas, Rhode Island, and Florida, according to the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit investigative news group.

SPN Ties to the American Legislative Exchange Council
Known ties of SPN affiliates to ALEC, current or former, are listed in the chart below:

* ''Individual sources for each think tank's ALEC ties are cited in the article on that specific think tank linked in the table. Please follow the internal links or see the full list of SPN member think tanks for more.''

SPN Think Tanks and ALEC's Corporate-Sponsored Legislation
SPN’s role in ALEC is multi-faceted. It is a member and funder, and its member think tanks sit on many ALEC task forces and plan ALEC workshops and trainings. Most importantly, SPN members regularly write bills and bring them to ALEC for consideration as ”model” bills with great success. Click here for a list of recent known “model” bills introduced by SPN think tanks.

Back in the states, when ALEC bills are introduced in state legislatures, the SPN think tanks are standing by to write the studies, spin the most favorable data, provide the expert talking points, put out the media releases, and do the press interviews that give an aura of academia to the efforts.

SPN think tanks have introduced, echoed, presaged, pushed, and reinforced ALEC policies to:

1) Attack Unions: ALEC's "Right to Work Act" seeks to limit union rights. SPN member state think tanks have published articles and reports supporting "right to work" legislation in at least Alabama, Kentucky, Ohio, Delaware, Oregon, Minnesota, Indiana, Michigan, Maine, New Mexico, and Pennsylvania.

SPN think tanks join ALEC in pushing a broad agenda to undermine other worker protection including tearing down collective bargaining, prohibiting paid union activity in the form of “release time,” and ending the ability to deduct union dues from paychecks for private and public employees (so-called “paycheck protection”). (See, for example, Michigan’s Mackinac Center and Arizona’s Goldwater Institute.)

2) Privatize Education: SPN think tanks join ALEC in pushing a broad education agenda to privatize public schools, including pushing for-profit online schools, for-profit charter schools, using taxpayer dollars for vouchers to for-profit schools, and even so-called “parent triggers” to allow a small group of parents to close a public school for current and future students, and turn the school into a charter school or require a voucher system. (See, for example, Texas, Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Alaska, Arkansas, Delaware, Georgia, Wisconsin, Hawaii, Maryland, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, and Wyoming.)

3) Privatize Public Pension Systems: SPN think tanks join ALEC in pushing to privatize public employee pension systems, making them 401(k)-style defined contribution type accounts rather than defined benefit plans. (See, for example, Connecticut, Wyoming, Washington, and Illinois.)

4) Rollback Environmental Initiatives: ALEC's "State Withdrawal from Regional Climate Initiatives" would allow states to pull out of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiatative or the Western Climate Initiative, cap-and-trade programs to cut greenhouse gases and carbon-dioxide emissions, and uses language that denies climate change. SPN state think tanks have published articles and reports supporting states' withdrawals from these regional initiatives in at least Alabama, Arkansas, Tennessee, Delaware, Oregon, New Jersey, Montana, Virginia, and Connecticut.

5) Disenfranchise People of Color, the Elderly, and Students: ALEC’s “Voter ID Act” makes it more difficult for American citizens to vote. It would change identification rules so that citizens who have been registered to vote for decades must show certain kinds of ID in order to vote. This bill disenfranchises college students and many low-income, minority, and elderly Americans who do not have driver’s licenses but have typically used other forms of ID. SPN state think tanks have published articles and reports supporting voter ID bills in at least Arkansas, Washington state, North Carolina, and Wisconsin.

Bills Introduced and Sponsored by SPN Think Tanks, 2010-2012

 * Arizona’s Goldwater Institute:
 * "School Choice Directory Act" (2012)
 * "District and School Freedom Act" (2012)
 * "Health Freedom Compact Act" (2011)
 * "Constitutional Defense Council Legislation" (2011)
 * "Model State Sovereignty Civil Rights Law" (2011)
 * "Sovereign State Interstate Compact" (2011)
 * "Subsidy Truce Compact" (2011)
 * "Model Legislation for Universal Regulatory Tax Credits" (2011)
 * "Prohibition on Paid Union Activity (Release Time) by Public Employees Act" (2011)
 * "Public Employee Paycheck Protection Act" (2011)
 * "Comprehensive Legislative Package Opposing the Common Core State Standards Initiative" (2011)
 * "Resolution Opposing the Implementation of the Common Core State Standards Initiative" (2011)
 * "Insurance Compact Enabling Act" (2010) - withdrawn by sponsors
 * "The A-Plus Literacy Act" (2010)
 * "State Sovereignty through Local Coordination Act" (2010)
 * "The Balanced Budget Certification Act" (2010)
 * "A Constitutional Amendment Requiring State Approval for Increases in Federal Debt" (2010)
 * "The Spending Evaluation Act" (2010)
 * Colorado’s Independence Institute:
 * Amendments to "Open Enrollment Act" (2010)
 * Illinois Policy Institute:
 * "Local Government Transparency Act" (2011)
 * "State Employee Health Savings Account Act" (2011)
 * "Pension Funding and Fairness Act" (2011)
 * Kentucky’s Bluegrass Institute for Public Policy Solutions:
 * "Intrastate Coal and Use Act" (2012)
 * Michigan’s Mackinac Center for Public Policy:
 * "Financial Accountability for Public Employee Unions Act" (2012)
 * "Election Accountability for Municipal Employees Act" (2012)
 * "Decertification Elections Act" (2012)
 * North Carolina’s John Locke Foundation:
 * "Patients First Medicaid Reform Act" (2010)
 * Texas Public Policy Foundation:
 * "Resolution on the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act" (2012)
 * "Provisional Licenses for Ex-Offenders Act" (2012)
 * "Civil Liability Relief for Employers Hiring Ex-Offenders Act" (2011)
 * "Treating Accused Persons Fairly Act" (2011)
 * "Criminal Intent Protection Act" (2011)
 * "Juvenile Offender Performance Incentive Funding Act" (2011)
 * "Resolution on Transparency and Accountability in Criminal Law" (2011)
 * "Regional Air Quality Interstate Compact" (2011)
 * "Health Care Compact Act" (2011)
 * "Health Professional Modernization Act" (2010)
 * "Resolution in Support of Victim Offender Mediation" (2010)
 * Washington State’s Freedom Foundation:
 * "Performance Audit Act" (2011)
 * "State Agency Lobbying Reform Act" (2011)
 * "Unfunded Pension Liabilities Accounting Act" (2011)
 * "Defined Contribution Pension Reform Act" (2010)
 * Washington Policy Center:
 * "Resolution in Opposition to the EPA’s ‘Greenhouse Gas Tailoring Rule’ and the Treatment of Biomass Energy" (2010)
 * "Legislative Transparency Act" (2011)