By Emily Cadei, CQ Staff

When it comes to the new federal lobbying law enacted last fall, the devil is in the details. That, at least, is the fear of the K Street crowd, who nervously await the first reporting deadline under the new, more rigorous disclosure regime, on April 21. But for a handful of legal professionals that specialize in such details, the new rules, and the apprehension they have generated among the lobbying industry, have created new business opportunities.

Take Roseanna Haley, a longtime employee at the Washington lobbying powerhouse firm Van Scoyoc Associates Inc. As part of her capacity as associate vice president for firm administration, Haley has overseen the filing of approximately 300 reports disclosing the activities of 50 in-house lobbyists.

ETHICAL ENTREPRENEUR: Roseanna Haley (CQ \ SCOTT J. FERRELL)

The new law changes the filing schedule from semiannual to quarterly and adds a raft of additional reporting requirements. Haley saw an opportunity to fill a growing need for lobbying disclosure assistance. Her new firm, Capitol Filings, opened its doors last week.

Capitol Filings is dedicated solely to helping lobbyists fulfill the increasingly complex tasks of monitoring and reporting on their business, as mandated by the federal government. Van Scoyoc will be Haley’s largest client, but she is otherwise targeting small to medium-size firms.

Large firms, she said, are “not my market. They already have a lot of dedicated administrative staff. It’s the people who don’t have the actual staff to help them.”

Many law firms offer similar services as part of their lobbying compliance practices. Attorney Chris DeLacy, who specializes in political and lobbying law at Holland & Knight, says his firm has taken over more filings for clients of late. And DeLacy said he has been devoting more time this year to advising clients on lobbying disclosures than any other area of his practice.

“There’s been a huge increase in work in this area — really starting in the fall after S 1 [the statute’s bill number] was signed into law and building ever since then,” said Joe Birkenstock, a political law attorney at Caplin & Drysdale. “It’s pretty much been nonstop.”

Birkenstock chalks up the demand for legal advice and filing assistance to fear in the lobbying industry of getting snared by the new regulations, not to mention the threat of harsher civil and criminal penalties for transgressions: “No. 1, you’re looking at five years in prison for non-compliance, and that really gets people’s attention.”