Northern Idaho News

Smaller Businesses Pushed Out of IACI by Larger Interests

Wool Growers, Grain Producers Drop Out of Idaho’s Most Powerful Lobby

By Jill Kuraitis, 7-13-06

This morning’s Idaho Statesman has a great story by Gregory Hahn saying that the Idaho Association of Commerce and Industry (IACI) has raised its annual dues high enough that splinter groups are a likely outcome of the IACI annual meeting this weekend at Tamarack Resort in Donnelly.

Hahn reports that IACI members have been asked to spend at least $5,000 a year for a seat at the group’s policy table. For wool growers, grain producers, and other small and agricultural interest groups, that’s a lot of cash, and apparently they’re not feeling represented by IACI in the state legislature.

The story also says that Chambers of Commerce and other business organizations are considering forming their own groups which would cater more to smaller businesses.

For more than a decade, IACI was synonymous with one man: its president Steve Ahrens, who retired after this year’s legislative session. Ahrens lead the group so successfully that if IACI opposed a bill, it just wasn’t going to pass, and everybody knew it. They were unstoppable. Despite Ahrens’ personal popularity, however, there were many times when lawmakers felt IACI’s influence was too….influential. Proposed laws that might have benefited small municipalities and businesses, or have been environmentally progressive, were routinely squashed.

But very few legislators have attempted to shout IACI down. The group freely handed out campaign money in a state where raising that kind of money is like herding snakes. And once you’ve taken money from them….

Ah. The oldest story in politics.

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