The red-light camera company at the center of a federal bribery investigation established branches of a consulting firm and a nonprofit “traffic safety” group in Columbus to help defend the cameras against opposition in the Ohio legislature.

The groups worked with Columbus officials to keep the city’s Redflex cameras flashing, though city officials said this week that they didn’t know Redflex was behind either the consultant or the nonprofit.

City records requested by The Dispatch show that people associated with Resolute Consulting began communicating with city officials as early as 2010.

Resolute Consulting is a lobbying group based in Illinois and started by Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s former campaign manager, Greg Goldner. Redflex is Resolute Consulting’s primary funding source.

Goldner, using Redflex money, then started the nonprofit Traffic Safety Coalition, a group that campaigns for camera programs across the country.

Together, the two groups lobby state and local lawmakers about the safety and financial benefits of cameras. The coalition often released statistics, issued reports to city officials and asked lawmakers to write opinion pieces for local newspapers that put the cameras in a favorable light.

>> A history of red-light cameras in Columbus

In Columbus, the coalition and Resolute Consulting walked the halls of the Statehouse together through most of 2014, trying to defeat a bill that effectively banned the cameras. It says cities cannot issue citations from the cameras unless an officer saw the infraction.

State legislators passed the law this year, and Columbus and other cities stopped issuing citations in late March, saying that posting police officers at each camera would be too expensive.

But the relationship among Resolute, the Traffic Safety Coalition and Redflex was never disclosed, Columbus officials said this week.

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Sherry Kish, a deputy chief of staff for Mayor Michael B. Coleman, said on Tuesday that she became aware of the relationships recently, “when I was trying to collect records for the recent public-records requests.”

In an email in November 2014, Kish said the coalition was a “grassroots group.”

George Speaks, the city’s safety director and manager of the red-light camera program, also said on Tuesday that he was unaware of the connection.

David Goldenberg, vice president of Resolute Consulting, said that city officials were aware of Resolute and the coalition’s connection and their connections to Redflex. Documents show that Resolute Consulting disclosed its relationship in a disclaimer at the bottom of emails to Speaks and other city officials.

“It’s on our website, and we are transparent about who we are,” Goldenberg said, “right there on the front page of our website. We absolutely disclose the work that we do.”

The coalition was mentioned by federal prosecutors in Chicago as part of a $2 million bribery scheme that led to indictments of a city official, a lobbyist and former Redflex CEO Karen Finley.

Federal authorities in Chicago said Redflex and Finley paid Chicago city official John Bills cash that he spent on a vacation home, a boat, a Mercedes convertible and a condo in Arizona in exchange for helping Redflex obtain $124 million in city contracts. Bills managed the city’s red-light camera program until 2011, according to the Chicago Tribune.

Prosecutors in Chicago noted in federal court documents that Redflex increased its monthly payments to the coalition to cover payments to Bills. Goldenberg has denied the prosecutors’ allegations, saying that Bills was a consultant for the coalition.

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Goldenberg said Resolute opened a branch in Columbus — at the time its only location outside of Chicago and Washington, D.C. — because Ohio is a swing state, and the group was working on behalf of other companies and is a player in national politics.

Records filed with the state show that Resolute Consulting established its Columbus branch in November 2010. Resolute put former Ohio Democratic Party Executive Director Mike Culp in charge of the Columbus office.

Culp’s task was to campaign for red-light cameras, organize initiatives that market the benefits of the cameras and advocate for the continued use of the cameras by Ohio cities.

Resolute landed in Columbus about the same time that state Sen. Bill Seitz, a Republican from Cincinnati, was questioning the city’s program after he received a red-light ticket for rolling through a right turn on red in 2010.

Seitz called the ticket “ticky tack” and began asking the city for records and data on tickets. He met with Speaks and corresponded with City Attorney Richard C. Pfeiffer Jr.

Emails show that city officials were concerned about Seitz’s intentions.

“I have the belief that Sen. Seitz wants to curtail or do away with the photo red-light project, thinking it is all about raising revenue,” Pfeiffer wrote in an email in March 2010.

Beginning in 2013 and through nearly all of 2014, the coalition and Resolute Consulting, along with the local law firm Bricker & Eckler, were working with the city to try to beat back Seitz’s bill. Speaks said Redflex retained Bricker & Eckler.

Seitz said on Tuesday that he remembers “hours of testimony” from the Traffic Safety Coalition in support of the cameras but was unaware of the connection to Redflex.

“I am not surprised they created a stalking horse with a neat-sounding name,” Seitz said.

Culp, who now works for the mayor of Parma, said he left his job with Resolute in 2011. The company has since shuttered its Columbus office.

Culp did hand out campaign contributions to city leaders totaling $650 in 2010 and 2011. One of those was $250 to current Council President Andrew J. Ginther’s campaign in December 2010. Culp said those were personal contributions and not on behalf of Resolute.

Campaigns for Ginther, Coleman and then-City Council President Michael C. Mentel accepted larger contributions that federal court documents trace back through Redflex’s local lobbyist, John Raphael, and the Ohio Democratic Party.

Finley, the former Redflex CEO, said in her plea deal with the U.S. attorney’s office that those payments were bribes meant to help the company obtain and exp.... Coleman, Ginther and Mentel have all said they did nothing wrong. Records from them have been subpoenaed by the Justice Department

An FBI investigation continues.

lsullivan@dispatch.com

@DispatchSully