Surprises greet L.A. delegation during lobbying efforts.

SACRAMENTO -- It was an awkward and confusing moment near the end of a somewhat chaotic day.

Nearly a dozen board members of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce were sitting in the office of Keith Richman, a Republican state Assemblyman from Granada Hills and a natural ally for business. They were there to push for votes to place a giant infrastructure bond measure on the June ballot and the final hours to the Friday deadline were ticking away.

Democratic lawmakers were busy trying to add projects dear to their hearts to the multibillion dollar bond proposal, while most Republicans were opposed to what they regarded as reckless spending. For the L.A. chamber members, Richman was a key Republican to pick off. Three years ago, he pushed through the Legislature a ballot measure to dedicate 2 percent of the state's annual budget to infrastructure projects, though voters in the end rejected his proposal.

It didn't go well.

After flatly stating that California was bankrupt and taking time to explain the state's $6 billion structural deficit, Richman held up a piece of paper that contained a summary of the key provisions of the bond.

"I just got this today," Richman said. "This is supposed to be an infrastructure bond to fix our roads, bridges, levees. But look, here's 520 billion to build more school facilities--we've already spent $25 billion on that in the last five years. There's also money in here for housing. It's just fiscally irresponsible. While there may be enough votes to pass it, I'm going to vote against it."

There was a long pause and some nervous whispers. Of course they were disappointed that Richman, a moderate lawmaker, was not going to support the infrastructure bond proposal. But there were also some expressions of dismay about what appeared to be in the bond. These members had just spent most of their day running back and forth between legislators' offices urging key lawmakers to support it.

"We didn't realize all this school funding was going to be in it." one said. "It's supposed to be roads, goods movement and levees."

A clearly uneasy David Fleming, one of the lobbying team leaders and an attorney at the Los Angeles offices of Latham & Watkins LLP, said the chamber should still push on with its lobbying on behalf of the bond.

"We may not like everything that's in it. but what's the alternative? If we don't do this now, it will be even less likely to succeed in November and then we'll be left with nothing," Fleming said. "That's not acceptable either."

As it turned out, the proposal that Richman pounced on appeared to be a work in progress. Less than an hour later, the chamber lobbying team met with Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, who described a much different measure--one without most of the school funding. Yet even that was subject to change as legislative Democrats prepared to go into caucus.

All this punctuated what was a hectic day of lobbying for the 100 members of the L.A. Chamber-led local business delegation on its annual Sacramento trip. Because legislators and members of the Governor's staff were constantly being summoned to negotiations on the bond measure, previously scheduled meetings were constantly being shifted around. But that suited chamber leaders just fine.

"We could not have picked a better week to be up here, when something so crucial to our business community is on the table," said Brendan Huffman, the chamber's public policy manager.

Broad agenda

While the infrastructure bond and the need for funds for goods movement was front and center on the chamber's agenda, members also pitched lawmakers and their staffs on a host of other issues, ranging from film tax credit legislation to bills to raise the minimum wage and environmental regulations.

One of the more difficult moments took place early on, when the chamber's small business lobbying team broached the issue of film tax credits to Michael Miller, consultant to Senate President pro tempore Don Perata.

Steve MacDonald, president of FilmLA (formerly the Entertainment Industry Development Corp.) laid out the case for support for AB 777, a bill by Nunez that stalled in the waning hours of the last legislative session. But Miller wasn't buying it.

"The manufacturers come to us for the manufacturer's investment credit, as do the agriculture interests for theirs," he said. "My question to each of them is the same: We are running a structural deficit of around $6 billion. If we were to grant this tax credit, where do you propose we get the revenues to offset this in the short term? Or, if that's not possible, what programs do you propose cutting?"

MacDonald said that if the tax credit wasn't passed, the state would lose revenues as more and more feature film production migrated out of state. "It used to be Canada and Europe that were after our film jobs. Now, the biggest threat is coming from other states like New York and Louisiana. If you don't act, you'll see thousands of film jobs leave California."

That argument did not appear to sway Miller and it became clear that the chances of the Nunez legislation coming back this year were quite slim. "We're going to keep trying," MacDonald said.

Another major area of concern was the minimum wage. In his State of the State speech last January, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said he would support an increase in the minimum wage from the current $6.75 an hour.

"We may not like an increase in the minimum wage, but we aren't going to oppose it outright," Huffman told a consultant to the Senate Labor Committee.

But, he said, the chamber draws the line at indexing the minimum wage to inflation, much like Social Security benefits. Assemblywoman Sally Lieber, D-Mountain View, has a bill that would raise the minimum wage $1 to $7.75 an hour and then index the minimum wage to inflation. Virtually every business organization has opposed this, saying an automatic cost escalator could hit small business owners hard if economic growth slows.

However, throughout the day's meetings, it became clear that Lieber's bill will likely pass the Legislature on a party-line vote.