Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, August 7, 1994 TAG: 9408080064
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURA WILLIAMSON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
When Rep. L.F. Payne landed a seat on the House Ways and Means Committee last year, hope arose that Virginia's rising star in Congress would use his new position to flash some light - and some money - on his constituents back home.
The sky is bright above the 5th District these days, as the House leadership prepares a bill that reveals the Nelson County Democrat's influence around the edges.
Because of Payne, tobacco farmers will see a much-lower-than-expected tax increase on cigarettes.
Because of Payne, rural doctors and health clinics will get a financial boost.
Because of Payne, academic health centers - such as the University of Virginia - will pocket a 1 percent tax paid on health insurance premiums.
Provided, that is, the bill becomes law. Chances of that happening may be slim, because the Senate leadership produced a bill last week at significant odds with what's coming out of the House. Many are wondering whether it will be possible to meld the two into a bill that can pass Congress this year.
But whether or not Payne's fingerprints remain visible on the final bill, he likely will emerge from the health care debate as a serious player on national issues.
"I think he will continue to rise in importance," Rep. Ben Cardin, D-Md., said. "I think he's already important."
How important can a freshman committee member be?
As far as some lobbyists are concerned, any member of Ways and Means is a big fish. Payne, a member of Congress since 1988, is beginning to look even bigger, because he succeeded in getting what he wanted - or most of what he wanted - put into the committee bill.
His amendments endured when the bill became the model for House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt's health reform plan, one of only three bills guaranteed to come to a vote. The others are a Canadian-style, single-payer plan and a bill put forward by Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, D-Maine.
Payne's role on the committee also may earn him an enduring place on the bookshelf. Washington Post writer David Broder recently interviewed Payne for a book he is writing about health care reform.
While much of Payne's pork package was easy for other committee members to swallow - he wanted $250 million for rural health care initiatives - what's not so easy to understand is how someone with so little experience on the powerful tax-writing panel was able to singlehandedly lower the tobacco tax.
One committee member wanted a $2-per-pack tax on cigarettes, up from 24 cents. The subcommittee on health approved $1.25. Chairman Sam Gibbons, D-Fla., wanted a 60-cent increase.
Payne lowered the increase to 45 cents, phased in over five years.
How did he pull it off?
"Just by doing everything right," said Rep. Peter Hoagland, D-Neb., also a member of Ways and Means.
Almost immediately after he joined Ways and Means, Payne asked the Virginia Farm Bureau to gather a group of tobacco farmers from his district - which includes Franklin, Henry and Patrick counties, most of Bedford County, and Martinsville and the city of Bedford - to testify before then-Chairman Dan Rostenkowski, D-Ill.
Payne brought 22 House Democrats - all representing districts where tobacco is grown - to the meeting and argued that raising the tax on cigarettes would cost thousands of jobs.
Rostenkowski, who would need those 22 votes when the bill came before the full House, seemed supportive, Payne said. "He wanted to help."
But then Rostenkowski was indicted on charges of defrauding the government and obstructing an investigation of his office. Gibbons stepped up to take his place, and Payne had to start all over again.
He pulled his 22 Democrats together again and made a deal with Gibbons: In exchange for the lower tobacco tax and the rural health package, Payne would vote for employer mandates, a financing mechanism that would force employers to pick up 80 percent of the cost of their workers' health insurance.
Payne won, but not without taking some heat from the business community.
A successful businessman known for developing the Wintergreen resort - and representing a district saturated with small businesses - Payne frequently had voiced opposition to employer mandates. He initially voted against an amendment to include them in the bill. When he changed his vote, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce jumped on him.
"Payne has turned his back on businesses in Virginia and across the nation," Bruce Josten, chamber senior vice president, said in a news release sent to Virginia newspapers. He called Payne's vote "an outrage."
His reversal also caught the attention of Republican George Landrith, Payne's opponent in this fall's congressional elections.
"Everybody hates employer mandates," said Greg Mourad, Landrith's press secretary. Landrith, an Albemarle County lawyer, plans to use Payne's vote against him during the campaign.
"It's going to put small business out of business," Mourad said.
Landrith also plans to attack Payne on the tobacco tax issue. He'll argue that Payne could have prevented the increase altogether.
"It's going to hurt him quite a bit," Mourad said.
Payne, though, thinks his role in the health care debate will help him win re-election. His involvement as one of about half a dozen swing votes - moderate-to-conservative Democrats who couldn't be counted on to side with Gibbons - already has brought his campaign more than $100,000 in health care lobbyists' money. That's about one-fourth of the money he has accepted from political action committees since January.
The money had nothing to do with his votes, Payne said.
"My driving motivation in all of this has been to fight for the things important to the people I represent," he said. "I think I've really done that."
Certainly the tobacco lobby is holding no grudges against him.
Al Glass, a lobbyist for the Virginia Farm Bureau, said that while tobacco farmers were unhappy with any tax increase, they saw Payne's ability to hold it to 45 cents as an indication that they had gained a powerful ally.
"Being able to derive that 45 cents showed that he is and will be a major player on the House Ways and Means Committee," Glass said. "We're just happy that he was able to move that vote in the right direction."
And despite harsh criticism from the national chamber, the Virginia Chamber of Commerce - supportive of Payne because of his work on the North American Free Trade Agreement - continued to stand by him.
Even the national chamber backed down after Payne said he would work with it "to move forward on health care reform without employer mandates."
Josten said that, in retrospect, he could understand why Payne, who has 5,000 tobacco farms in his district, made the trade that he did.
"I think he had to," he said. "If you sat in his chair in that district, I think he had to vote that way. ... I think Congressman Payne legitimately doesn't like mandates. He's got major pressures on both ends."
However the final vote comes down, Payne's fellow committee members say his performance on this issue has earned him respect, an asset that could benefit the 5th District in the days ahead.
Hoagland said he respects Payne because he makes sure he knows what he's talking about.
He is the only committee member, for example, known to have spent $40,000 hiring his own lawyer to help him wade through the complex health care legislation.
"He always understands issues better than anybody else," Hoagland said.
And he has something else going for him that few others in Congress appear to have: He's generally considered to be a "nice guy."
That helps, Cardin said, when he needs to get others on his side.
"He's got that knack for getting along," he said. "There are not many people who can do that."
Memo: ***CORRECTION***