American Legislative Exchange Council
| American Legislative Exchange Council | |
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| Basic facts | |
| Location: | Arlington, Va. |
| Type: | 501(c)(3) |
| Top official: | Lisa B. Nelson, CEO |
| Year founded: | 1973 |
| Website: | Official website |
The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a national nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit member organization. It brings together state legislators and those in the private sector to develop policy proposals that promote free markets, limited government and federalism. ALEC is organized into task forces and policy centers that focus on the broad range of issues it seeks to engage.[1]
Mission
According to its profile on Google+, the American Legislative Exchange Council has the following mission:[2]
| “ | Our mission is to advance and promote the principles of free markets, limited government, and federalism through our nonpartisan public-private sector partnership of state legislators, members of the private sector, non-profit groups, and individual donors.[3] | ” |
History
The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) was founded in September 1973 by former Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.), conservative activist Paul Weyrich and Lou Barnett, who worked for former President Ronald Reagan's (R) 1968 presidential campaign. Through the 1980s, ALEC developed task forces to work on policy proposals that states could use to make legislation. These task forces eventually became more like think tanks as ALEC sought more input from its private sector members.[4]
Work
The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. According to its website, ALEC has over 2000 members and claims to be "the nation's largest nonpartisan, individual membership association of state legislators." These members work together with private sector members to try and "develop policies and programs that effectively promote the Jeffersonian principles of free markets, limited government, federalism, and individual liberty."[5]
ALEC members meet to discuss how to approach a wide range of issues:[6]
| Click to view all of the issues ALEC covers | ||
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ALEC approaches each of these issues through its ten specialized task forces, which focus on particular groups of policies.[7]
| Click to view all of ALEC's task forces | |
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ALEC also has three policy centers that address certain areas of policy.[8]
Center for Innovation & Technology
The Center for Innovation & Technology website states that the center "provides state lawmakers with guides, data, research and a structure to imagine and create a plan of action for how innovation could benefit their states." The center works to examine policy improvements and help states experiment with new policy ideas.[9]
Center for State Fiscal Reform
ALEC's Center for State Fiscal Reform is designed to "provide sensible solutions for responsible budget reform by helping legislators understand what works and what fails" and help states address budget constraints without raising taxes.[10]
Center to Restore the Balance of Government
The Center to Restore the Balance of Government at ALEC focuses on federalism and aims to "help realize the goals articulated in the Tenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution." The center examines policies with the idea that "decisions that impact individual, local communities should be made by at the local level." It works to "provide tools for state lawmakers to set priorities for state control over state issues."[11]
Model policies
ALEC's task forces and policy centers publish "model policies" for states to use when drafting legislation.
In December 2015, ALEC's Tax and Fiscal Policy Task Force published a draft of a proposed "Tax Reduction Fund." The fund would work to lower state budgets by transferring "funds that may be available in the budget that would otherwise be spent and returning those dollars to taxpayers by reducing the broadest state tax." On the webpage describing this idea, ALEC includes a draft of proposed legislation that a state could use to implement such a fund.[12]
ALEC's website included over 700 other model policies in January 2016.[6]
Rich States, Poor States report
- See also: ALEC Rich States, Poor States Report
ALEC releases an annual report entitled Rich States, Poor States: ALEC-Laffer State Economic Competitiveness Index, which analyzes economic competitiveness in each state. The report is authored by Arthur Laffer, Stephen Moore (chief economist at the Heritage Foundation), and Jonathan Williams, the director of the Tax and Fiscal Policy Task Force at the American Legislative Exchange Council. The report seeks to note which states' policies might produce economic growth and which states' policies might inhibit economic growth.[13]
Leadership
The executive team of the American Legislative Exchange Council are as follows:[14]
- Lisa B. Nelson, Chief Executive Officer
- Lisa Bowen, Vice President, Finance and Administration
- Michael Bowman, Vice President, Policy
- Bartlett Cleland, Vice President, Center for Innovation and Technology
- Jeff Lambert, Vice President, Member Relations
- Bill Meierling, Vice President, Public Affairs
- Jonathan Williams, Vice President, Center for State Fiscal Reform
These people make up the board of directors of ALEC:[14]
Finances
The following is a breakdown of the American Legislative Exchange Council's revenue and expenses for 2010-2014:
| Annual revenue and expenses for the American Legislative Exchange Council, 2010-2014 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Tax Year | Total Revenue | Total Expenses |
| 2014[15] | $7,795,674 | $7,734,819 |
| 2013[16] | $7,322,531 | $8,510,952 |
| 2012[16] | $8,425,051 | $8,642,647 |
| 2011[1] | $9,218,069 | $7,105,525 |
| 2010[1] | $7,171,357 | $5,874,206 |
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms American Legislative Exchange Council. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
External links
- American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)
- ALEC on Twitter
- ALEC on YouTube
- ALEC on Facebook
- ALEC on Linkedin
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 GuideStar, "American Legislative Exchange Council IRS Form 990 (2011)," accessed January 8, 2016
- ↑ Google+, "American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "History," archived December 20, 2015
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Membership," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 American Legislative Exchange Council, "Model Policies," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Task Forces," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Policy Centers," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Center for Innovation & Technology," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Center for State Fiscal Reform," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Center to Restore the Balance of Government," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Tax Reduction Fund," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Rich States, Poor States," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ 14.0 14.1 American Legislative Exchange Council, "Leadership," accessed January 8, 2016
- ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Public Reporting," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ 16.0 16.1 GuideStar, "American Legislative Exchange Council IRS Form 990 (2013)," accessed January 8, 2016
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