by John T. Reurink
July 3, 2009

Those who make up Lansing’s political infrastructure (lobbyists, PR flacks, legislators and staffers) include a ton of bright, talented and, let’s admit it, very competitive people.

So it was no surprise when the week before the release of the 2009 MIRS/EPIC/MRA Insiders’ Survey results, I began receiving e-mails, phone calls and few “I’ve gotta know” comments.

The problem with measuring the pulse of and generating a ranking for such a competitive group of people is a topic that’s been the bane of governments and institutions for years — just who has the right to vote?

Some of you may ask why MIRS would even need to limit the vote at all? Why not just send it to every Tom, Dick or Harry who’s ever had even a tangential connection to state government? The only reason to wade into the proverbial swamp of who gets to vote is to ensure it’s an accurate, reflective poll with one vote per insider.

To solve that problem, MIRS developed a system in 2007 that was used again this year. We start with the Lobbying Guide put out by The Rossman Group, add all legislative offices, all state department directors and department legislative liaisons, and cross check it against MIRS’ subscriber list to make sure we weren’t missing anyone obvious.

As it turned out, the final poll results weren’t too terribly different than they were two years ago. In the end, it showed that despite the near constant churn of faces moving through the legislature vis-à-vis term limits, the Lansing consulting, lobbying and news community remains constant and the strong performers consistent.

Before getting into the winners and losers, I’d like to make a note about one category in particular that got a lot of attention.

For the most effective special interest (often association or corporate) lobbyist this year we had a three-way tie between Auto Dealers of Michigan’s Kurt Berryman, AT&T’s Jim Murray and Rich Studley of the Michigan Chamber of Commerce.

There is a caveat on this particular question that wasn’t highlighted in MIRS. We did ask participants who they would rate as the “second choice” for top association or single-issue lobbyist, and Berryman held the edge on that question by 1 percent — so some could argue that works as a tie-breaker. Then again, I can probably name two Lansing insiders who might argue the contrary.

When asked about what they thought about term limits and the state’s leaders — both executive and legislative — insiders weren’t terribly impressed. This year there was only one lawmaker who had bigger positive job approval numbers than negative job approval numbers, and that was Rep. Kevin Elsenheimer (R-Kewadin). It’s highly probable that Elsenheimer was the only one in this position because he’s only been in the legislative leadership crucible for five months.

Perhaps accounting for the overall negative perception of political leaders, the Lansing community’s assessment of term limits has soured over the past 24 months. Just over half (51 percent) contend that the state’s public policy process has been hampered to the point where compromise cannot be reached in Lansing — up from 29 percent two years ago.

On the question of who is the most successful lobbyist in the pantheon of multi-client lobbyists, Steve Young netted the most votes. His firm, Government Consulting Services Inc. (GCSI), also won most effective multi-client firm honor, and officemate Nell Kuhnmuench netted the second most votes in this grouping.

Kelly Rossman remains the high priestess of public relations, having been voted number one PR flack for the third MIRS Insiders’ Survey (since the beginning). Rossman’s coven of spin-masters comprise the most effective PR firm in Lansing, according to the survey.

Within the legislature itself, one surprising vote was that Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop (R-Rochester) was selected as “least effective” member of the Michigan Senate. Interestingly, Bishop also came within two points of winning “most effective” vote — losing out to fellow GOPer Mark Jansen (R-Grand Rapids).

Most effective in the House was Speaker Andy Dillon (D-Rochester) and least effective was Rep. Dave Agema (R-Grandville). On the staff side, Suzanne Miller Allen was voted the most effective overall staffer. Gary Olson, director of the Senate Fiscal Agency, and Mitch Bean, director of the House Fiscal Agency, won their respective chamber’s best non-partisan staffer contest.

When asked about most effective partisan staffer, Allen again won in the House while Cindy Peruchietti won in the Senate.

Two years ago, the MIRS/EPIC/MRA Insiders Survey asked about what news source Lansing insiders viewed as having the best Capitol coverage. This year, MIRS won the first-place ranking in this category with 63 percent (up 3 percent from 2007) of the vote, compared to 18 percent (up from 11 percent in ’07) for the next closest publication: Gongwer News Service. Michigan Public Radio netted a 5-percent share of the vote, with all other sources coming in at or below 2 percent.

Tim Skubick again won most effective reporter by securing 33 percent of the vote, followed by MIRS’ Kyle Melinn, who netted a 15-percent share. Dawson Bell of the Detroit Free Press came in third with 10 percent of the vote.

On a new question about the media, we asked insiders which one Capitol reporter they considered the “most credible,” and Skubick, who hosts Off the Record, writes for MIRS and publishes a column in this publication, again took the top vote.

What all this tells us is that the lobbying and public relations communities are very stable over the past 24 months. The 10-point gain in “best Capitol coverage” by MIRS and Gongwer, show the continuing decline of mainstream media coverage of the state’s Capitol.

John T. Reurink is publisher of Michigan Information & Research Service Inc. in Lansing.