Councilmembers Alarcon, Cardenas, And Hahn Hold Key to Fair Elections in Los Angeles
City Council vote to be held today on Los Angeles Voters' Bill of Rights
PRESS RELEASE from the California Clean Money
Campaign
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Trent Lange, (310) 428-1556
LOS ANGELES - The Los Angeles City Council is scheduled to
vote today on a critical electoral reform package, the Los
Angeles Voters' Bill of Rights. Introduced by
Councilmembers Jose Huizar, Eric Garcetti, and Paul Koretz,
the Voters' Bill of Rights is designed to increase the
city's anemic voter turnout and strengthen its public
matching funds program to limit special interest control
over elections.
"The outrageous amounts of money in politics, with over
$2 billion likely to be spent in this year's Congressional
elections, shows that Los Angeles needs to dramatically
improve its campaign finance system before the new tidal
wave of spending hits here", said Trent Lange,
President of the California Clean Money Campaign. "The
Los Angeles Voters' Bill of Rights is a key step towards
allowing Los Angeles to better respond to the flood of
ever-increasing special interest money."
A key component to the plan is to remove the cap on the
city's matching funds Trust Fund. This will ensure that the
full $3 million a year that Los Angeles voters specified go
to public financing of campaigns when they passed the
matching funds program in 1990 are available for qualified
candidates. The city's matching fund system has increased
the importance of small contributors and enabled grassroots
candidates to run competitive campaigns, but has been used
by fewer candidates in recent years. No general funds
beyond those already allocated by the voters' would be
required.
Removing the Trust Fund cap will also allow the city to
move to full Voter-Owned Elections, or Fair Elections
public financing of campaigns, when more funds become
available, so that candidates who show a broad base of
support have the option of running without raising any
special interest money.
The Voters' Bill of Rights is supported by groups like the
League of Women Voters of Los Angeles, California Common
Cause, Southwest Voter Registration Education Project,
Greenlining Institute, and the Los Angeles Federation of
Labor. Its passage by council would put a measure on the
March 2011 ballot to amend the city charter.
Councilmembers Paul Krekorian, Tom LaBonge, Ed Reyes, and
Bill Rosendahl have all shown support for joining
Councilmembers Huizar, Garcetti, and Koretz in voting Yes
on raising the Trust Fund cap. Unfortunately,
Councilmembers Bernard Parks, Jan Perry, Greg Smith, Herb
Wesson, and Dennis Zine have either indicated they're
likely to vote no or have voted no on similar measures in
the past, though they could still vote for reform this
time.
That leaves the fate of Fair Elections in Los Angeles up to
Councilmembers Richard Alarcon, Tony Cardenas, and Janice
Hahn. All have endorsed full public financing measures in
the past, but have not yet taken a position on raising the
public matching funds Trust Fund cap.
"Hopefully Councilmembers Alarcon, Cardenas, and Hahn
will help the city address the huge growth in special
interest fundraising by giving voters the chance to
strengthen the city's public financing system,"L said
Lange. "They have all championed Clean Money and Fair
Elections in the past, and this is the perfect opportunity
for them to do so again."
Councilmembers Alarcon, Cardenas, and Hahn are all
Democrats. The California Democratic Party platform states
that "California Democrats believe that a healthy democracy
is based on clean, fair elections… We will work for
public financing of political campaigns at all levels of
government…"
Public financing of campaigns are supported by Los Angeles
voters, as indicated by the 52% of city voters who voted
Yes last June on Proposition 15, the California Fair
Elections Act.
#####< br> The California Clean Money Campaign is a non-partisan 501(c)3 organization whose mission is to build statewide support for public funding of election campaigns. For further information, visit www.CAclean.org.
(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.)