Drew Wilson
Lobbying firm Lewis Longman & Walker earned an estimated $1.1 million last year, new compensation reports show.
The lobbying team Lori Killinger, Kasey Lewis, Terry Lewis, James Linn and Martin Lyon brought in $540,000 of that haul lobbying the Legislature and received another $535,000 lobbying the Governor and Cabinet.
Lobbying firms report their pay from each client in ranges covering $10,000 increments. Florida Politics uses the middle number in each range to estimate total revenue for the quarter. The annual earnings estimate is the sum of the firm’s four quarterly reports.
LLW represented 28 clients for all or part of last year, five of which broke the century mark — the Florida Association of Nurse Anesthetists, Florida Association of Special Districts, Florida Manufactured Housing Association, Minto Communities and Seminole Improvement District all paid $120,000 in retainers, $60,000 for legislative lobbying and the same amount for executive branch lobbying.
The special districts niche was well represented on LLW’s reports. In addition to the statewide association, LLW represented the Sebastian Inlet District, Coral Springs Improvement District, Lealman Special Fire Control District, East Manatee Fire Rescue District and Indian River Mosquito Control District.
A handful of household names also showed up on the reports, including vacation rental platform RaceTrac Petroleum and Airbnb. Airbnb has pushed for Florida to adopt a statewide vacation rental regulatory framework for the past several Legislative Sessions, and the 2021 effort is off to a fast — and eventful — start.
LLW’s quarterly earnings were mostly unharmed by the pandemic, and in a couple quarters the firm actually managed to post gains year-over-year.
If each of Lewis Longman & Walker’s clients paid the top dollar in their reported range, the firm could have pulled in as much as much as $1.7 million last year. According to the minimum earnings reported each quarter, LLW earned no less than $800,000 in 2020.
Florida lobbyists and lobbying firms faced a Feb. 14 deadline to file compensation reports for the period covering Oct. 1 through Dec. 30. Compensation reports for the first quarter of 2021 are due to the state in mid-May.
