Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, November 3, 1995 TAG: 9511030094
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAVID M. POOLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Long
Virginia election laws that require candidates to identify who contributes to their campaigns are routinely violated, but rarely enforced, a review of campaign contributions shows.
Even the chairman of a state Senate committee who drafts those laws doesn't follow them.
State Sen. Joseph Gartlan, D-Fairfax County, failed to name the occupation or employer for most of the individual contributors to his re-election bid this year.
Are the contributors Gartlan's neighbors lending a hand? Or, are they people with special interests seeking access to a senior lawmaker? There's no way to tell from his campaign finance reports.
Gartlan is not alone in lax compliance with disclosure laws. One in five contributors to General Assembly campaigns this year wasn't identified by occupation, according to a computer analysis by The Roanoke Times and its sister paper in Norfolk, The Virginian-Pilot.
Candidates also identified some contributors as ``businessman,'' a catch-all that could apply to anyone from storefront barber to hazardous-waste hauler.
Yet no candidate has been fined for vague or incomplete disclosure this year. Candidates get away with skimpy campaign reports because the state Board of Elections lacks the staff to enforce the law.
``I don't really want to broadcast that, but that's the reality when we have to push so much paper,'' says M. Bruce Meadows, the board's executive director.
Disclosure is supposed to be the safeguard built into campaign finance laws in Virginia - one of only eight states that does not limit contributions. Lawmakers who for years have resisted caps say the system works fine because anyone interested can learn who is giving money to candidates.
``Everybody knows what they need to know,'' says House Majority Leader Richard Cranwell, D-Roanoke County.
The public can know, for instance, that doctors are providing a balm for state Sen. Clarence ``Clancy'' Holland, D-Virginia Beach, in his tough re-election campaign. Physicians have provided half of the $45,895 that Holland - himself a family doctor - has raised from individuals giving more than $100, according to a computer analysis of contributions through Sept. 30.
But vague entries make it difficult for the public to know how contributors might try to influence representatives.
This summer, state Sen. Brandon Bell, R-Roanoke County, reported receiving $1,250 from D.J. Cooper, whose occupation was listed as ``self-employed.'' The report did not mention that Cooper owns a trailer park, which is under a consent decree with the state Department of Health because of water quality problems.
James Faulkner, Bell's campaign manager, said it was difficult to describe an occupation because Cooper is retired and has a variety of business interests.
``We didn't want to put down everything, so we just put down `self-employed.' We weren't trying to hide anything,'' Faulkner said.
Disclosure works best when big money is involved. Candidates tend to come forward with the required information - occupation, employer and business address - about donors who give a few thousand dollars. The press digs deeper into jumbo donations, such as the $160,000 two Roanoke brothers gave Roanoke Valley Republican challengers Trixie Averill and Newell Falkinburg and the $125,000 Smithfield Foods gave a political action committee led by Gov. George Allen.
The system, however, breaks down when it comes to contributions of $1,000 or less. A handful of candidates are meticulous. But many don't bother to fill in lines reserved for the occupation and employer of all people who give less than $1,000.
Some reports leave a lot to the imagination. One candidate listed contributors' occupations as ``individual'' and another marked them ``private.''
When asked about those and other entries, several candidates said they were unaware of what their reports contained.
Cranwell, whose campaign finance reports often are flawless, said many candidates rely upon volunteer treasurers who don't have time to note occupation and employer with every $100 check that comes in the door.
Some candidates said they were unaware of the specifics of the law, which holds them and their treasurers jointly responsible for errors and inaccuracies. Gartlan - a vocal advocate of tougher campaign laws - got it wrong even though he wrote the law.
Gartlan said he was under the impression that reports had to include occupations only for donations of $250 and up. But it was Gartlan's own bill two years ago that lowered the threshold to $100.
``We're going to have to file an amended report,'' said Jinny Peters, his campaign manager. ``Joe is going to die when he finds out he hasn't been complying.''
Vague and incomplete disclosure is nothing new. The problem was epidemic in 1989 statewide elections, according to an analysis by Common Cause, a nonpartisan citizen's lobby group.
Then, many candidates provided no occupation for supporters who accounted for nearly half of their contributions. The worst offender was Eddy Dalton, a GOP candidate for lieutenant governor who got 85 percent of her money from people not fully identified in her reports.
In recent years, the General Assembly has tightened reporting requirements - but has not given the state Board of Elections the resources to enforce them.
Michael Brown, who was elections board director until January, last year hired temporary workers who reviewed reports for thoroughness and sent out scores of notices of fines ranging from $50 to $300.
Lawmakers' reactions were immediate.
``You would have thought I was the Ayatollah of Virginia,'' Brown recalled. ``I got raked over the coals by every single individual who filed a report.''
The assembly this year revised the law, requiring the Board of Elections to give a candidate time to correct the bad report before imposing a fine.
Notices of fines stopped, but not because candidates had cleaned up their act. The Board of Elections, under Allen administration appointee Meadows, is busy with more pressing election-year tasks and can't make time to review reports, Meadows said.
The staff situation wasn't helped this year when the Board of Elections - traditionally one of the state's most underfunded agencies - lost three of 18 positions under the Allen administration's buyout program for ``non-essential'' employees.
``We just decided that others [in the office] would have to pick up the slack and we would have to do the best we could,'' Meadows said.
In some states, the forms are filed electronically, making them easier to audit. Virginia still uses paper copies. Overworked elections board workers cope with mounds of paperwork that pour into the office each month. To audit for accuracy, those workers would have to sift through 20,000 contributions by hand.
Automation, Meadows said, is the answer. But that would be costly and involve time for planning - something Meadows said is in short supply this time of year.
``I haven't stopped to figure it out because we don't have time to figure it out.''
Staff Writer Lise Olsen contributed information to this story.
Keywords:
POLITICS
by CNB