Beason's lobbying earnings


Don Beason made over $100,000 in the first half of the year.

According to filings with the Secretary of State's office, 15 corporate clients paid Beason a total of $107,671 from Jan. 1 to June 30, 2007.

Two clients, Carolina Ballet and Dale Earnhardt Inc., paid nothing. The ballet said Beason had donated his services. The city of Hickory did not pay Beason directly, but reimbursed Catawba County for half of its contract.

The largest single contract was the county, which paid Beason $32,903, according to the filings. (The county's records showed a slightly different amount.)

Another large client was Sigma Corp., a New Jersey-based maker of pipe fittings, which registered Beason as a lobbyist on May 21. The company paid Beason $27,000 in the second quarter of the year.

Progress Energy, the Raleigh-based electric utility, paid Beason $8,500.

Other contracts for clients such as BB&T, Cingular Wireless and the Albemarle Mental Health Center, were worth between $3,000 and $4,000 each in the first half of the year.

Update: AT&T North Carolina, formerly BellSouth, is also a Beason client, but it does not show up on his clients listings. According to the company's filings, it paid him $2,940 in the first half of the year. His total earnings have been updated.

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