It’s always a good week for freebies for the legislature.
The free meal feedbag this week, not including special fetes for honored committees that don’t hit the main calendar, includes:
TUESDAY
Lunch, noon, Capitol Hill Building, Arkansas Advanced Energy Association
Reception, 4 p.m., CARTI Cancer Scenter, CARTI Foundation.
Reception, 3-6 p.m., American Legion building, American Legion Department of Arkansas.
Dinner, 5:30 p.m., Bevis Farm, North Little Rock, hosted by NAHRO Housing Authority
WEDNESDAY
Lunch, 11:30 a.m., Association of Arkansas Counties building, Walmart
Reception, 4:30 p.m., Capitol Hill building, Fort Smith Regional Chamber of Commerce
THURSDAY
Lunch, 11 a.m., Capitol Hill building, Arkansas Speech-Language-Hearing Association.
The Jon Woods Memorial Ethics Amendment of 2014 outlawed free meals provided by lobbyist to legislators. Or so you might have thought. Alas, no. The amendment also extended term limits and provided a way to enormous pay raises for legislators. Woods no longer benefits. He resigned last year during a federal investigation that has now produced an indictment saying he took kickbacks from state taxpayer money he funneled to, among others, a so-called Christian college in Springdale.
UPDATE: A couple of the committee swillathons this week.
TUESDAY
Dinner, 6 p.m., Riverfront Steakhouse, Senate Agriculture, Forestry, and Economic Development, host Arkansas Farm Bureau. -\
TUESDAY
Dinner, 6 p.m., Samantha’s, Joint Energy Committe, hosts are Balanced Energy Arkansas and SWEPCO. (don’t know if Samantha will burn coal instead of wood in its grill in honor of the payers.)