THE TIES THAT BLIND

By KAREN TUMULTY

IN MOST CONGRESSIONAL OFfices, there is someone like Ann Eppard: the fierce gatekeeper deciding who sees the Congressman and who doesn't, the lieutenant whose years of iron loyalty have been rewarded with his deepest trust, the steward of his fund raising. Rarely are these staff members known outside the lawmaker's narrow orbit. But when Eppard left Capitol Hill the day after the 1994 election to start her own lobbying firm, many of the nation's richest interests were clamoring to sign her up, showering her with hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees.

That's because Eppard had served as the closest of advisers to E.G. ("Bud") Shuster of Pennsylvania, who after the 1994 election was suddenly elevated to chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, a position from which he can steer billions of dollars to specific projects and industries. And while House rules put a 12-month ban on Eppard's directly lobbying her boss of 22 years, she had free access to the rest of the committee and its staff. She kept her job as Shuster's chief Washington fund raiser, earning $3,000 a month for arranging receptions and speaking engagements. Among her new clients, which include Federal Express, Union Pacific and the Outdoor Advertising Association of America, she found a wellspring of eager contributors.

For a congressional staff member to use the ties of government service to provide a lucrative, comfortable afterlife "happens all the time,'' Shuster correctly notes. But theirs is a coziness that is drawing new scrutiny in these increasingly self-conscious times in Washington. The watchdog group Common Cause plans this week to ask the House ethics committee to look into the relationship between the chairman and his former aide, who continues to serve as his top political adviser. What got people talking was a story that appeared earlier this month in the twice-a-week Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call. Just after dawn on Jan. 25, the paper's reporter spotted the 9th district Congressman and Eppard pulling out of her recently purchased $823,000 town house. She was driving her 1994 Dodge sedan, which bears the official-looking license plate "US House PA 9." Shuster, it turns out, has rented out his only Washington residence, and acknowledged last week that while Congress is in session he now spends two or three nights a week at Eppard's home or in his office. But he, his wife and five children issued an angry statement denouncing the "maliciously untrue innuendo" raised about Eppard. They noted that the chairman's son--himself a congressional candidate and fund-raising client of Eppard's--was also at her home that morning.

Whatever the personal relationship between Eppard and Shuster, the story has drawn attention to another, more common type of intimacy between Congress members and those who seek to influence them. Says Josh Goldstein of the Center for Responsive Politics: "His situation really describes in a compact way the culture of Washington." Even while working as a lobbyist, Eppard heads a fund-raising operation for Shuster that in 1995 surpassed $600,000. The effort is all the more remarkable as he has run unopposed since 1984, when he trounced Nancy Kulp, who played Jane Hathaway on the Beverly Hillbillies. In November he faces Monte Kemmler, a largely unknown county planner.

Despite the lack of a challenger, Shuster has found ways to spend the money. He has consistently led all other Congress members in the amount his campaign spends on meals--$70,913 during the 1992 election cycle, according to Dwight Morris, co-author of The Handbook of Campaign Spending. (His nearest competition was renowned steakhouse habitue Dan Rostenkowski, who spent $28,734.) And Shuster's campaign travel budget has ranked near the top among House members, although his district is a mere two-hour drive from Washington by way of a four-lane stretch of highway officially designated the Bud Shuster Byway.

Shuster and Eppard insist that he has done nothing special for his longtime aide or her clients. But the real value of effective lobbyists is the ability to make a member of Congress pay attention to the causes they promote. At a conference committee on highway legislation last fall, Shuster rankled some in the Senate by tying up talks for weeks with his demands to loosen the federal restriction that keeps billboards off scenic roadways. The billboard industry is both an Eppard client and a leading Shuster contributor. One question that Common Cause may ask the ethics committee to investigate is whether a lobbyist's providing free lodging to a Congress member violates the gift ban that the House, with much self-congratulation, passed late last year. Shuster maintains that he has "meticulously complied" with all ethics restrictions. He says his stays with Eppard were cleared by the committee, which refuses to comment.

But that new gift rule includes a locomotive-size exemption for lobbyists who happen to be "personal friends" of House members. And if the bonds of mutual benefit between Shuster and Eppard say anything, it is about what constitutes friendship in Washington.

--With reporting by Melissa August/Washington

With reporting by Melissa August/Washington