Campaign Reforms Contain a Surprise, Anger GOP Leader

SACRAMENTO —  The state Fair Political Practices Commission approved regulations Tuesday requiring candidates to name the office they are running for before they start raising campaign money.

But the commission allowed candidates to announce for more than one office and then gave them unexpected freedom to decide how to use their campaign contributions.

The commission, in completing work on the most controversial features of the political reform initiative Proposition 73, also gave final approval to regulations that ban taxpayer-financed mass political mailings after making several key amendments to the regulations on mailings adopted last July.

FPPC Chairman John Larson said he was “pleased” with the overall body of regulations approved by the commission to implement Proposition 73, which was passed by voters in the June primary election. “I am satisfied we are doing what the voters intended with Proposition 73,” Larson said.

But Assembly Republican Leader Ross Johnson of La Habra, who led the drive to pass the political reform initiative, said the FPPC violated the “spirit of Proposition 73” by passing several of the regulations at a daylong session Tuesday.

The assemblyman was especially miffed that the FPPC ignored the recommendation of its own staff and applied a liberal interpretation to the question of whether officeholders will be able to announce for multiple offices and then decide which campaign account to deposit contributions.

The dispute centered on a provision of Proposition 73 requiring candidates to specify the office they intend to run for before they start raising contributions. In putting that provision into regulation form, the FPPC said candidates must announce for one office but that they could also announce for other offices. An incumbent member of the state Assembly, for instance, will be able to announce that he is running for reelection as well as for the state Senate.

Both Johnson and the FPPC staff recommended that the commission adopt a regulation requiring that any contribution that does not designate a specific campaign account be returned to the contributor.

Instead the three members of the FPPC who attended Tuesday’s meeting adopted a regulation saying that if candidates receive contributions that do not specify a particular office they can decide where they want to put the money.

Johnson called that FPPC action “outrageous.” He contended that candidates can announce for two offices, hold a big fund-raising dinner, then decide where to put the money based on the success of the dinner. “That’s absolutely against the spirit of what Proposition 73 set out to do,” he said.

The Republican lawmaker also said an exemption to the ban on mass mailings that will allow officeholders to put their names on mailings announcing public meetings “creates a loophole big enough to drive a truck through.”

Strict Interpretation

Johnson argued during Tuesday’s hearing that a strict interpretation of Proposition 73 meant a complete ban on taxpayer-financed mailings promoting officeholders, including relatively innocuous sounding announcements of meetings. Johnson said such announcements give an advantage to incumbent officeholders because they circulate their names among voters and give the incumbents a leg up over challengers.

Larson, in voting for the mailing regulation, said if Johnson’s fears are borne out and “we find it is being abused, we can quickly amend it.”

Commissioner Michael B. Montgomery said after voting on the new regulations that his support of Proposition 73 is now tempered with “reservations” because he believes the overall effect of the measure will be to help the incumbents stay in office.

He said a parade of lawyers and officials representing officeholders, who protested various features of Proposition 73 at the hearing, were shedding “crocodile tears.” “It’s going to hurt unwary challengers a lot more than it’s going to hurt savvy incumbents,” Montgomery said.