WASHINGTON — There’s a sweet story set in the nation’s capital, a tale devoid, mostly, of political knife fights and grenades.
Sen. Mark Kirk, a Republican from Illinois, maintains a Senate tradition dating to 1965, a time when he was in kindergarten at Fairmount School in Downers Grove.
He is assigned to Desk No. 95, which is near the Senate’s most heavily used entrance, making it perfect to serve as the chamber’s “candy desk.” Kirk, his aides and Illinois candy manufacturers keep it stocked with treats for senators and staff members. It’s loaded with confections such as Jelly Bellys, bite-size Snickers bars and Ferrara Pan chocolates.
“Senators, being older, can get kind of grumpy in the afternoon, and have this tradition of being able to reach into this desk to get a treat,” Kirk, 52, said.
Chocoholics in the chamber need not worry because Kirk won’t name names. It’s partly discretion, partly the nature of his calorie-laden cache. Rather than staying at his desk and minding the store, Kirk is often buttonholing colleagues on the Senate floor.
“I’m deep in the well [of the Senate] talking to 15 members about 14 things,” he said. “The desk kind of runs itself. I can’t tell you individual [candy] preferences. It’s a ‘drive-by’ pickup they do ...a pretty stealth swoop.”
His own weakness? When sugar-free Orbit gum won’t suffice during a “hypoglycemic dip,” Kirk chooses chocolate.
Kirk won a special election in November 2010 and entered the Senate that month, putting him ahead of the pack of newcomers who arrived in January. The timing led Senate cloakroom staff members to give him a crack at the candy desk, telling him that if he turned it down, they would seek out Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, home of the Hershey Co.
Kirk found the prospect a sweet deal because it would let him draw attention to Illinois manufacturers. The candy desk originated with Sen. George Murphy of California and has been passed on to 13 other Republicans, including Sen. John McCain of Arizona and former Sens. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania and George Voinovich of Ohio.
Kirk’s trove is available to Democrats and Republicans alike. Democrats also maintain their own candy desk, which is not occupied by a member, on their side of the aisle.
Kirk said he started out with several Illinois candy makers, including Wrigley, Tootsie Roll Industries, Garrett Popcorn Shops and Long Grove Confectionery Co.
Under Senate rules, members may accept donations of products such as coffee, candy, peanuts and juices from the states they represent if certain conditions are met. The products must be inexpensive, used for promotional purposes (such as free distribution) and available to visitors to the lawmakers’ offices.
Kirk estimated that he pays out-of-pocket, using his own money, for about 75 percent of the candy; the rest is given to his office. Since the year began, he said he’s spent between $200 and $300 to stock the candy desk.
Lee Althans of Long Grove Confectionery, based in Buffalo Grove, Ill., said the company owner, John Mangel II, and his wife have been longtime supporters of Kirk, who served in the House for almost 10 years before entering the Senate.
When Kirk landed the candy desk, his aides contacted the company to see if it would like to help stock it, Althans said. “A fun tradition,” she called it. “It’s good publicity for us, but the main interest was to show Sen. Kirk that we support him, and we think that he inherited a real neat thing.”
Bill Kelley, a vice chairman at Jelly Belly Candy Co. and top employee at its North Chicago plant, said the company sends Kirk sample packs of Jelly Bellys, chocolate Dutch mints and Sunkist Fruit Gems.
Kelley said the company also sends candy to Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Rep. Bob Dold, R-Ill., of Kenilworth. “We send candy to our Illinois congressman and to our senators on a regular basis, just as a public service to our country,” Kelley said.
Bonbons are serious business. The National Confectioners Association said 4-year-old data showed that Pennsylvania had 9,995 jobs in 150 companies making chocolate, other candy or gum; Illinois had 7,400 jobs in 85 firms; and California had 6,550 jobs at 210 companies. Christopher Coleman, the association’s director of government affairs, said the figures are the most recent the association has.
While Kirk’s a fan of candy, there’s no love lost between him and the sugar industry. He and other Illinois lawmakers are challenging the industry’s insistence on import quotas, which the lawmakers say inflate the price of sugar. In an interview, Kirk said sugar growers, whom he called big political givers, were “very powerful and very corrupt.” He, Durbin and others have sponsored legislation that Kirk said would lower the price of sugar for manufacturers and consumers.
At the American Sugar Alliance, a trade group for sugar farmers, processors and refineries, spokesman Phillip Hayes condemned Kirk’s “hateful language” and defended the quotas. They “keep unneeded sugar from flooding the U.S. market, sending prices downward to the point that U.S. producers go out of business and the U.S. becomes reliant on unreliable foreign producers,” he said.
Kirk plans to serve a two year term as keeper of the candy desk, then turn it over to a newcomer. Meantime, he’s branched out beyond Illinois-made sweets. “Ten months in office, I’m starting to be more customer-flexible,” he said. That means if a fellow senator requests a candy, Kirk aims to stock it in the candy desk.
And when only the least desirable candies - the “fuds and duds,” Kirk calls them - are left, he gets on the horn. “It will yield a panic call back to the staff to immediately drive to CVS - and find supply.”
Front Section, Pages 7 on 10/23/2011