By Tim Swarens

They just had to say thank you.

Thank you to the lobbyists who supplied the 50 members of the Indiana Senate with popcorn, milk, soft drinks, bottled water, candy and even a Wal-mart gift card throughout the General Assembly’s 2009 regular session.

The show of gratitude came from the top. The day before the session ended in April – a session culminated by lawmakers’ failure to approve a state budget – Senate President Pro Tem David Long, R-Fort Wayne, found time to sponsor eight resolutions that piled praise on lobbyists for their generosity toward the legislature.

In one sense it’s a small matter, especially compared with the hundreds of thousands of dollars in luxury trips, prime tickets, expensive dinners and other gifts that lawmakers accept from lobbyists each year.

Yet the resolutions, approved by voice votes, also highlight the cozy and increasingly intense relationships that lobbyists build with Statehouse leaders. The gifts don’t stop, even on the Senate floor.

Lobbyists invested more than $25.8 million – $172,272 per lawmaker – courting legislators on behalf of their clients during the most recent annual reporting period. It’s a record amount, and one that continues to grow as lobbyists’ reports trickle in six months after the filing period ended on April 30.

Although most of the money went toward lobbyists’ salaries, a significant portion paid for handouts to legislators. Here are just three examples: The Indiana Motor Truck Association supplied more than $2,250 in transportation and meals to Senate Minority Leader Vi Simpson, D-Ellettsville; state Rep. Jack Lutz, R-Anderson, accepted more than $2,800 in gifts, including $609 from AT&T; for Indianapolis 500 race and parade tickets; state Rep. David Niezgodski, D-South Bend, received more than $3,100 in handouts, including almost $1,700 in tickets from AT&T; to attend NCAA basketball games and the Indianapolis 500.

It’s not just the amount of money that’s on the rise. In 2006, four registered lobbyists prowled Statehouse hallways for every one Indiana legislator. The ratio is now five to one.

“We get that ratio in Washington on only the very biggest issues,’’ Bill Buzenberg, executive director of the Center for Public Integrity, said. “On the state level, the intensity is there all the time. Lobbyists also have much more access to the lawmakers themselves in the states rather than working through staff on Capitol Hill.’’

The non-partisan center, which conducts investigative reports on public policy issues, gave Indiana an F grade in a study this year that examined legislators’ financial disclosure requirements. Indiana legislators, for example, are not required to report sources of income unless they exceed one-third of their non-legislative pay.

Buzenberg said corporations and special-interest groups have started to shift their lobbying efforts from the federal to the state level. “In so many ways, it’s easier (for lobbyists) to get things done state by state,’’ he said.

It’s especially easy in Indiana, where the General Assembly places no limit on the value of gifts its members may accept.

The legislature also serves as a farm team for lobbying firms.

In Indiana, a legislator can resign from the General Assembly one week and start work as a paid lobbyist in the Statehouse the next. Former state Rep. Mike Smith, for example, accepted his current post as president of the Casino Association of Indiana a mere two weeks ago after winning re-election to the House in 2002.

The promise of big money and a softer schedule has enticed more than 30 former lawmakers to make the switch to lobbying.

“I can stay in the state Senate, which I’ve been in for 16 years, attend meetings at night and weekends, and stand for re-election at $25,000 a year with per diem, or I can go out in the hall and not have to go to meetings at night, only follow the legislation that my clients care about, and make $200,000 a year,’’ former state Sen. Louis Mahern told the Center for Public Integrity. “You can only resist that for so long. I have to start thinking about my financial future or my children’s education.’’

Mahern made that statement in 2006. If anything, the pace of the revolving door has quickened since then, with former General Assembly stalwarts such as Bob Kuzman, Luke Messer and Matthew Whetstone joining the ranks of lobbyists in recent years.

It’s up to legislators to regulate themselves – which, until now, has meant that nothing changes.

Lawmakers who do push for reform feel pressure from their peers to back off. “Every time I bring up the issue (of ethics reform) it becomes pretty tense with my colleagues,’’ state Sen. Mike Delph, R-Carmel, said. “I’m fighting a culture of entitlement.’’

That may be changing. House Speaker Bauer, a fixture in the Statehouse for nearly 40 years, said in October that he will push an ethics reform package, including a one-year cooling off period before former lawmakers can work as lobbyists, in the 2010 session.

Bauer accepted $5,223 in gifts from lobbyists, more than any other lawmaker, during the reporting period from May 1, 2008 to April 30. He announced his plan five days after members of The Star’s Editorial Board informed the Speaker’s staff that 23 Indiana newspapers were preparing to launch a campaign for major ethics reform.

Delph, who has tried four times since 2005 to tighten rules regulating lobbyists’ interaction with lawmakers, thinks the time may be ripe for action.

“Most of my colleagues want to do the right thing, but there’s a culture at the General Assembly that needs to be corrected,’’ Delph said. “It’s about re-establishing the public trust.’’

Swarens is editor of opinion/community conversations at The Indianapolis Star. Contact him at tim.swarens@indystar.com or at (317) 444-6176.