Gifts given to Indiana Lawmakers

We need reform in the Indiana State House.

We need accountability from our state reps and senators. Normally, I am against regulations, however the 'regulators' need to regulate themselves.
Why is it that state law does not require lawmakers to report all gifts? I can understand a few items such as a hat, coffee mug, pencils, cards, etc from thankful citizens. However, the gift giving to Legislatures in Indiana must change.
I remember running a few years ago as a candidate for the Indiana State House and I received a really nice gift. An organization held a dinner at the South Bend Country Club for prospective candidates. This was no ordinary dinner. We were treated with prime rib and a four star service for myself and my wife. The only catch- we had to listen to their 20 minute presentation concerning the importance of eye glasses. Kind of boring, but the prime rib was excellent. As a candidate I accepted no other gifts to sway my potential vote and today,I regret taking the prime rib dinner.
According to the Indy Star, "The law requires disclosure of any gift to a legislator in excess of $100 in a day, or $500 during the reporting period." Remember, State law says that gifts like that can go unreported.That's a lot of grub; at a really nice place. If our government officials want to be transparent, then they must change the law. With the example of the prime rib dinner, the organization never supplied a receipt, therefore it would be impossible to report the true cost of the dinner.
If I would have been elected, do you think that this organization would have reminded me of the great dinner we had before the election? You bet!
How many votes are being cast by organizations buying legislatures with Pacer tickets, Indy 500 tickets, Colts tickets or a night on the town for a return on their investment via voting "their" way.
The total dollars reported by state lawmakers equals 24 million. Can you imagine what you can get with that kind of money. The bigger problem-how many gifts went unreported! Most of the gifts came in small packages making it hard to trace, therefore making one wonder whats really going on in Indy.

Included is a report provided by INDYSTAR.com. The numbers below reflect the Speaker of the Indiana House and the gifts he received. I would encourage you to go to the website and check out your rep.

Lobbyists and the Legislature

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Direct gifts to individual lawmakers

The law requires disclosure of any gift to a legislator in excess of $100 in a day, or $500 during the reporting period. These are often defined in the reports as "expenditures" in the overall data, rather than as gifts, so The Star looked through every report in order to tally these results.

Chamber	Legislator	Lobbyist	Description of gift	Value of gift
House	Bauer, B. Patrick (D-South Bend)	AT&T	Democratic National Convention	$108.03
House	Bauer, B. Patrick (D-South Bend)	Baker & Daniels	Dinner with family	$234.78
House	Bauer, B. Patrick (D-South Bend)	Indiana Motor Truck Association	Meals and travel costs	$840.77
House	Bauer, B. Patrick (D-South Bend)	Roche Diagnostics	Hotel for two nights to President Obama's inauguration	$1,142.72
House	Bauer, B. Patrick (D-South Bend)	Indiana Motor Truck Association	Meals, airfare, hotel	$2,896.75
House	Bauer, B. Patrick (D-South Bend)		Total for Rep. B. Patrick Bauer	$5,223.05

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Note: State law does not require all gifts to legislators to be reported. For example, if a legislator attends a reception to which all members of the General Assembly were invited, the cost of that meal would not be listed in these records.