A good-government advocacy group is questioning the need for a special committee created by House Speaker John M. Perzel to help draft a lobbyist-disclosure bill.

In a letter to Perzel released to reporters yesterday, Barry L. Kauffman, executive director of Pennsylvania Common Cause, said that a bill passed by the Senate last year and awaiting a House vote was the product of three years of negotiations and public hearings and that "there is no need to start from scratch."

"Everything a commission might do already has been done," Kauffman wrote. "Therefore, it is highly improbable that it could discover or propose anything not already discussed at length in public - and it could serve only to further impede this long-overdue legislation."

Pennsylvania is the only state in the nation without a law requiring lobbyists to report how much they spend to influence public policy.

Kauffman distributed copies of his letter before a news conference where Perzel announced the eight members of an advisory committee charged with recommending regulations that would apply to lawyers who lobby the legislature. The committee includes lawyers, former state Supreme Court justices, and a Democratic legislative aide.

Why an advisory committee? Either Perzel doesn't understand how to write laws himself or he wants a scape goat for if he decides not to pursue this further.