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Even as this year's polarizing presidential race commands most of the attention from the press and pundits, restaurateurs also are keeping an eye on several of the 2008 congressional elections. [...]

JANUARY STARTING OFF THE YEAR with a bang, Home Depot Chairman and CEO Robert Nardelli announced his resignation on Jan. 3. He never quite recovered from a fiasco of a [...]

Meet the candidates--big and small--Whose actions could affect your business. But just how well do they understand your issues? WHEN DEMOCRATIC presidential hopeful Al Gore recently accepted the endorsement of [...]

Has the time come for independent restauranteurs to split from the NRA? In the year since his appointment as its president and CEO, Herman Cain seems well on his way [...]

Food service operators are involved in lobbying campaigns to reform laws that directly affect their business. These include efforts to eliminate the fees paid to music licensers for playing music in restaurants and immigration law reform since immigrants make up a substantial part of the restaurant labor minimum wage hikes, business meal tax deductibility and health care reform., FROM THE MINIMUM WAGE AND WELFARE REFORM TO BUSINESS-MEAL DEDUCTIONS AND IMMIGRATION LAWS, RESTAURANT OPERATORS HAVE A MAJOR STAKE IN WHAT'S GOING ON IN WASHINGTON. Matt McMahon won't let his [...]

Restaurant operators can unite and oppose government mandates which could take a toll on their businesses. In Denver, CO, when the purchase of new police cars would mean additional taxes for restaurants, the Colorado Restaurant Assn. began lobbying for taxes which shall be shared by all businesses. As a result, no tax increase was made and police cars were bought within the city's existing budget. Other successful lobbying efforts involve proposition 166, smoking ban in public places and an increase in excise taxes on beer, wine and liquor., DON'T THINK FOR A MOMENT YOU'RE HELPLESS IN THE FACE OF GOVERNMENT MANDATES. HERE'S AN INSTRUCTIVE LOOK AT HOW SOME RESTAURANT OPERATORS BEAT THE BUREAUCRACY BEFORE IT STEAMROLLED THEM. At [...]

The restaurant industry is very clear on its dissatisfaction with Pres Bill Clinton's tenure in the White House, yet industry executives must choose between a multitude of Republican presidential hopefuls, most of whom have not yet voiced any opinion at all on industry-specific issues. Republican contenders for the presidency include such heavyweights as Bob Dole, Phil Gramm and Arlen Specter, but any number of others may yet enter the race. Issues that industry executives hope will be addressed by the successful candidate include music-copyright-licensing reform, the Targeted Job Tax Credit and business-meal deductions. A short analysis of each candidate's platform is presented., Were they to characterize their lives and times under Bill Clinton's presidency, restaurant operators might come up with something like The Big Sting. They've been stung by new limits on [...]

Restaurant operators were excited in Nov 1994 by the incoming Republican legislature, but actual political change may take longer than hoped for. Democrats have warned that they will hold up any bills which call for fast deregulation of environmental and financial laws, such as the ones which limit the deductions allowed for business meals. However, the industry can be pleased with Speaker Gingrich's position on raising the minimum wage, on health standards, disability laws and mandated healthcare., SO MUCH FOR REVOLUTIONS. AFTER THE GOP'S election sweep, many people in the restaurant industry figured all was right with the world. And why not? Wasn't that House Speaker Newt [...]

It is anticipated that the Democrat Party will lose seats in Congress and in gubernatorial elections on Nov 8, 1994, as part of trend in voter dissatisfaction with the Clinton administration, and the restaurant industry is pleased with this trend. The restaurant industry opposes the Clinton administration's health care reform plan, and it has been lobbying against it through the National Restaurant Association's (NRA) Political Action Committee. Results of a survey of restaurant owners' political attitudes is presented, and the amount of the NRA's contributions to various candidates is listed., He's a restaurateur and a political moderate who opposes employer health-care mandates. He's a self-made, Yale-educated businessman. A Vietnam veteran. And, to hear Alaska Restaurant Association director Carol Wilson tell [...]

POLITICAL CLOUT ISN'T GIVEN, IT'S WON BUT FIRST YOU HAVE TO START A MOVEMENT. The movement started, as all must, with one man's faith. For years, Rick Walsh, director of [...]

Concern over the societal effects of alcohol abuse, drunk-driving and other sins related to the consumption of liquor, beer and wine has given ammunition to groups working hard to curtail [...]

Restaurant operators and local restaurant associations are finding themselves on the frontlines of the minimum-wage battle, which in the recent past has moved more frequently from Capitol Hill to local [...]

WASHINGTON -- McDonald's Corp. joined the chorus of voices urging the U.S. Department of Agriculture to implement further safeguards to protect the U.S. beef supply from mad cow disease since [...]

SAN FRANCISCO -- A measure on the November ballot here places this city among the growing ranks of political jurisdictions considering the adoption of minimum wages that are significantly higher [...]

WASHINGTON -- While U.S. lawmakers labor to reconcile the House and Senate versions of President Bush's tax cut plan, restaurant association officials here are confident that the foodservice industry will [...]

WASHINGTON -- In an address to the National Restaurant Association's annual Public Affairs Conference earlier this fall, former Republican National Committee chairman Haley Barbour dismissed some political action committees for [...]

Before beginning an address to a group of grassroots lobbyists gathered in Washington, D.C., for the National Restaurant Association's GO Lobby Day recently, President George W. Bush's senior adviser, Karl [...]

Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act has pit the Texas restaurant industry against a federally funded disabled-rights watchdog, Advocacy Inc. Restaurateurs accuse Advocacy of using ultimatums and other strong-arm tactics to enforce compliance with the law, which requires business and government services to be accessible to the physically handicapped. The industry is lobbying the federal government to neutralize the agency., AFTER TEXAS MONTHLY BRANDED ADVOCACY INC. WITH A 'BUM Steer Award' for suing an Austin mental-health center because of the time it held its board meetings, the state's foodservice operators [...]

Elaine Graham, the new senior director of government relations for the National Restaurant Association, is a powerful and persuasive lobbyist. In Jun 1994 she replace Mark Gorman, who was more of a planner than a doer. Graham's first successful lobbying effort for the industry was the eliminate a 1990 amendment to bar HIV-positive people from food service work. She lobbied unsuccessfully to prevent business meal tax deductions from being reduced from 80% to 50%. Most recently she has been lobbying against employer-mandated payments for health insurance., LOBBYING CAPITOL HILL IS A TOUGH job, hard on a social life, nerves, and shoe leather. But it has its good days, and today, the last day of June, has [...]

CALIFORNIA RESTAURANT ASSOCIATION Championing Change After over a decade of fighting smoking restrictions every step of the way, the California Restaurant Association (CRA) - among the most influential state restaurant [...]

Call it the summer of broadcasters' discontent, but Washington's swampy weather this year could be especially hot for media companies. Promising to raise the temperature are hearings and meetings debating [...]

GMB union backs move to protect workers' rights and stop private equity firms stripping assets from companies By Emily Manson The Government has been urged to reform company law to [...]

... The International Brotherhood of Teamsters plans to launch a national boycott of three big restaurant chains because they continue to accept supplies from the foodservice unit of Performance Food [...]

* The Michigan Public Service Commission launched an investigation into five companies that distribute electricity in the state to determine their role in the blackout and their efforts to restore [...]

Byline: Paul Winston Remember your mother forcing you to eat your vegetables, no matter how much they made you gag? Well if that made you resentful, just wait until other [...]

One year after Multnomah County banned smoking in restaurants but spared bars and taverns, the Oregon Legislature is considering a bill that would accomplish the same statewide. Backed by the [...]

DISTRIBUTORS TO BE TAPPED NEXT IN PLANNING IMPORT BAN STRATEGIES The National Restaurant Association (NRA), Washington, DC, and the American Meat Institute (AMI), Arlington, VA, were set to meet at [...]

Legislators are continuing discussion of various foodservice-related matters on Capitol Hill this session, including: * Smaller restaurants (gross receipts less than $5 million annually) will be able to trim their [...]

Efforts to rally support for new federal restrictions on competitive foods in the nation's schools met with a mixed response during the American School Food Service Assn.'s Legislative Action Conference [...]

One year ago, the newly formed Council of Independent Restaurants threw down the gauntlet at its inaugural conference. 'The national chains are mounting a well-financed, aggressive assault on the nation's [...]

The 107th Congress comes to Washington facing a full platter of legislative leftovers from the 106th, including a hefty serving of issues directly concerning the foodservice industry. Heading the list [...]

Lehman inks WTC lease Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. has lined up a lease for 500,000 square feet at 1 World Financial Center. The investment bank plans to use the space [...]

It is inevitable in a presidential election year that almost everyone will be watching what happens at the top of the ticket. Will George W. Bush and the Republicans send [...]

Foodservice lobbyists are urging Congress to help stabilize the industry's workforce by enacting a series of immigration law reforms that would make it easier for aliens to find work or [...]

The International Franchise Association says franchisors and franchisees need to communicate effectively -- and in today's tight labor market, those relationships never have been more important. That's one reason the [...]

NATIONAL RESTAURANT ASSOCIATION'S LEGISLATIVE FLY-IN IS WELL TIMED. It couldn't have happened at a better time. That's the assessment National Restaurant Association President Steven Anderson gives of this year's 'Spring [...]

Just when you thought it was safe to confront food safety as an issue within your control, along comes a food-quality concern that no group of operators seems to agree [...]

SACRAMENTO, CALIF. -- Restaurant employers in California should brace for a costly spike in workers' compensation premiums this year, according to the grim legislative outlook gleaned by some 225 operators [...]

The California Restaurant Association fiexed its growing muscles at the Capitol during its recent annual lobby day, when restaurateurs met with all 120 legislators in their offices. The saturation lobbying-marks [...]

'It is too bureaucratic and paperwork focused.' That's what the National Restaurant Association had to say about OSHA's proposed workplace ergonomics rule. The NRA stated that implementing the 1,000-plus page [...]

ATLANTA -- Going public with its mission to guarantee the safety of restaurant meals, the Georgia Hospitality & Travel Association is lobbying for a law that would mandate industry-administered sanitation [...]

If we were boxers, the referee would stop the fight, our trainers would throw in the towel, and the boxing commission would prohibit us from ever stepping into the ring [...]