http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/26/2792/Waiting for Good Dough
by Lina Lerer
The click of heels against the marble floors echoes through the halls as staffers hurry to happy hour, yoga or home. It’s 6:30 p.m., and the entire Dirksen Senate Office Building is rushing.
Everyone except Hans Scheltema, who leans against the wall in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee room.
Scheltema, a hulking man in a blue Hawaiian shirt, isn’t going anywhere fast. In T-shirts and sweat pants, Scheltema and about 20 others flip through newspapers and talk about nothing. Mostly, though, they are just waiting, as they will be for another 16 hours.
They are the patient, the uncomfortable, the poorly paid. They are line-standers.
Like the Capitol Police or Bullfeathers bartenders, line-standers make their living off Congress and those who lobby it.
Hearings are crowded places, filled with legislators, staffers and press. Only a few spaces are reserved for the general public, which includes lobbyists, lawyers and other political professionals.
Line-standing gives the professional influence-peddlers an edge over the lowly academics and public advocates.
The more money the client pays, the earlier the line-standers arrive and the better the chance of nabbing a front-row spot.
It’s not uncommon for firms to pay line-standing companies thousands of dollars, a fraction of which trickles down to the actual person waiting in line. The process is money in politics personified: Wealth gets a seat in the room.
It’s a fully developed industry, complete with managers, wranglers and dozens of part-time employees. Two companies, CVK and Congressional Services Co., dominate. CVK is the oldest, with many of the richest clients.
The line-standing business is intimately woven into the fabric of Congress. Company bank books ebb and flow with the congressional record.
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