Companies lean on Idaho insiders to make government contacts

As French-owned nuclear services company Areva went hunting last month for someone to chat up Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter on its proposed $2 billion uranium enrichment facility in Idaho, it sought an insider for the job.

It found Erika Malmen, who isn’t just a former state Office of Species Conservation and U.S. Department of Interior lawyer; she’s also wife of Jeff Malmen, who since the late 1990s guided Otter in his ascension from lieutenant governor to the U.S. House – and finally back to Boise as state chief executive starting in 2007.

Until November, he was Otter’s chief of staff, quitting to work as a lobbyist for the Idaho Power Co. just two months before his wife was hired by Areva.

Full Story: http://www.idahobusiness.net/archive.htm/2008/02/13/Companies-lean-on-Idaho-insiders-to-make-government-contacts