HARRISBURG -- Senate Democrats regularly feasted on such things as salmon cakes, gourmet bread, grilled shrimp and pork tenderloin last session.

On the day before 2005's infamous middle-of-the-night pay raise, Democratic Leader Robert Mellow treated his staff to a catered breakfast -- served on china for a $45 extra charge.

Top caucus staffers regularly splurged on $40 dinners at fancy restaurants, once dropping a $134 tip on top of a $366 bill for 10 dinners.

All of it was at taxpayer expense, and most of it was in stark contrast to spending by Senate Republicans.

Senators get a $146 per diem for lodging and meals in Harrisburg, but receipts filed with the Senate chief clerk indicate members also availed themselves of numerous additional options for dining at public expense.

They included catered lunches, business meals with constituents and breakfasts with staffers, according to a review by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette of the spending accounts managed by Democratic and Republican leaders for the 2005-2006 fiscal year.

"As long as they have per diems, there's no justification for all these catered meals," said Tim Potts of Democracy Rising PA, a watchdog group.

Spending on meals was one small part of the $92.1 million it cost to run the Senate in the last fiscal year, up from $85.8 million the previous year, according to a 2005-06 financial audit by Ernst & Young of Philadelphia.

Legislative luncheons
Senate Democrats spent three times as much as Republicans on catered lunches last year. Bills totaled $31,333 for 50 catered meals held Mondays and Tuesdays when the chamber was in session. They included double servings of entrees, side dishes of halibut with bean sauce, desserts and, always, an $85 cheese-and-vegetable tray.

Senators said those were working lunches where lawmakers discussed bills and received updates from staff.

Records show the meals cost $15 to $39 a plate and were ordered to serve 20 to 35 people, but Mr. Mellow said they served more. Typically, 50 or 60 lawmakers and staffers showed up at each luncheon and many returned on Wednesdays to reheat leftovers, he said.

"It's an opportunity for people to have lunch without having to leave the Capitol and without having to go to the cafeteria [in the Capitol basement]. These are people that work hard, and this is the best way to utilize their time," Mr. Mellow said.

"I don't want any of my staff leaving the Capitol on session days. It is a condition of their employment that they not go out to lunch on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays" when the Senate is in session, he said.

Otherwise, the caucus might have to hire an additional receptionist and an additional researcher to compensate for work time lost during lunch hours spent away from the office on busy session days, Mr. Mellow said.

Republicans, meanwhile, spent $9,377 on 23 legislative meals during the fiscal year. Most cost between $12 and $20 per person and attendance was limited to legislative leaders and key staffers, said caucus spokesman Erik Arneson.

The full caucus had two meals together last year, both during an annual daylong planning session at the Wyndham Garden Hotel in Hershey. One meal cost $29 a plate and the other, $22.

Soft drinks are purchased separately at a cost of more than $6,000 per caucus annually.

Committee luncheons
When the Legislature isn't in session, lawmakers sometimes charge catered meals to other accounts such as, during budget time, Appropriations Committee accounts.

Appropriations accounts provided for eight catered lunches for Democrats last winter and eight for Republicans. Meals in both caucuses averaged about $25 a plate.

Democrats ordered $6,864 worth of meals for 35 people during two weeks of budget hearings last year.

Republicans spent more than twice as much -- $15,084 -- and fed 75 people, including staffers.

"It was appalling," said Sen. Gibson Armstrong, R-Lancaster, who ended the luncheons in January when he became Appropriations Committee chairman. "There's absolutely no reason why taxpayers should pay for our lunches when we're already getting per diems."

The appropriations luncheons started many years ago as a way to provide sandwiches to committee members so they could move through budget hearings without breaking for lunch, Mr. Armstrong said.

"It started getting bigger and more expensive and they started inviting everybody, everyone on the staff, anyone in the Capitol who wanted to show up," and the luncheons became catered events with hot entrees and fancy desserts, he said.

"I stopped it as soon as I got in a position to," he said. "I'm very serious about cutting costs and we have to look at all avenues, whether it's luncheons or shifting our priorities. It's a small example of the things we have to do."

Republican committee members still sorder in during hearing days, but now they split the bill and pay it out of their own pockets.

"That's what per diems are for. You buy your own lunch," Mr. Armstrong said.

Business meals
Taxpayers also fund lawmakers' private dinners with constituents, staffers and executives seekinsg to bring business to Pennsylvania. And they pay for high-priced transportation to take lawmakers to those meetings.

In May, for example, Mr. Mellow and two Democratic staffers took a $6,338 ride on a private plane from Wilkes-Barre to Washington, D.C., for a luncheon with government officials to discuss plans for a new medical school in Scranton. The group dined at The Oceanaire Seafood Room, where the bill came to $69 per person.

Reached on Friday, Mr. Mellow said he had never asked how much the plane ride cost but that it was a prudent expenditure.

"It's a sound business principle to handle things the way we've handled them. Without the help of the federal government, a medical school is almost impossible to build today," Mr. Mellow said.

Staff dinners
Compared to some Democratic staffers, rank-and-file senators are eating on the cheap.

Top Democratic aides regularly dine together at upscale restaurants in and around Harrisburg, according to receipts they filed for reimbursement.

Their bosses last fiscal year authorized $7,490 worth of business dinners for the same core group of staffers. The group comprises some of the Senate's highest paid aides, most with salaries of $75,000 to $154,000, more than most elected officials earn.

One dinner for 16 cost $650 -- more than Republican staffers spent on taxpayer-funded meals for the whole year.

On another day, Mr. Mellow's chief of staff, Tony Lepore, took seven aides out for a $309 dinner at Juliana's restaurant in suburban Harrisburg where, records show, they discussed property taxes. Mr. Lepore returned the next night with a group of 10 for more discussion of property taxes and $500 more worth of food.

On the same two days, those staffers also had the opportunity to avail themselves of buffet luncheons in Mr. Mellow's office.

Their Republican counterparts had staff lunches, too. Theirs were usually over $7 calzones or $4.50 tuna sandwiches.

Typical Republican staff lunches last year came from eateries such as Al's Pizza and Subs and cost less than $6 per person. During one meeting, 14 staffers shared $39 worth of pizza.

Mr. Mellow justified his staffers' pricey meals by saying Harrisburg restaurants are expensive and that dinner meetings are the best way to get top staff together for after-hours business.

"Our people work hard. We think it's important that if a dinner meeting is going to be had we invite all our top staff," he said. "I don't think it's any different in private business and people are always saying we should be running government like a business."

The caucus has no rules for staff dinners except that tax money cannot be used for alcohol, Mr. Mellow said.

A thrifty option
Senators of both caucuses also eat in the Senate lunchroom, which offers meals on session days for an annual fee -- $200 last year and $295 this year, said Senate Chief Clerk W. Russell Faber. Forty-four of the 50 signed up this year and most eat there each session day.

They pay out of their own pockets, not with tax dollars. However state-paid maintenance workers -- who otherwise work on plumbing and carpentry projects -- cook a daily hot entree and stock the lunchroom with cold cuts and produce for members to make their own sandwiches and salads.

"Most of our caucus members take part in the lunch room and they do get work done there because they're able to eat together there," Mr. Arneson said. "We don't need a caucus luncheon to do that. It goes back to the fiscal conservatism that permeates how we handle a lot of things."

Mr. Mellow said he hasn't joined the lunchroom because he doesn't have time to go there. The lunchroom is one floor above his office.

Senators also spend money on meals through accounts other than the leadership accounts that the Post-Gazette examined. These include committee budgets and lawmakers' individual spending allocations that fund district office operations, auto leases, office supplies and more.

It would take a comprehensive audit -- beyond Ernst & Young's -- to uncover all sources of Senate spending on meals, said Mr. Potts of Democracy Rising PA.

"We need to know what they're spending," said Mr. Potts, who is troubled by the freewheeling approach to spending taxpayer dollars on expensive meals while also collecting per diems.

"This is symptomatic of the larger problem. If they're not careful with that money, they're not going to be careful with other spending and that's how we end up with outrageous taxes and underfunded programs," he said.