At last night’s Santa Ana City Council meeting, speaker after speaker addressed the council on the proposal to weaken campaign finance restrictions. The proposal would have removed the provision designed to limit the ability of members to raise money for three months after their council votes.
All of the speakers expressed concern over the proposal. In addition to recommending the proposal be shelved, one speaker, Robin Cook, suggested the council modify the proposal to extend the time period barring contributions to twelve months instead of three.
The staff report accompanying the proposal did not indicate which council member requested the proposal be considered. That question was cleared up when the matter came up for discussion. Mayor Miguel Pulido deferred to Councilwoman Michel Martinez who moved to continue the proposal for 30 days. Coincidentally the matter will not come up again until after the June primary election.
Martinez had come under fire since the posting of the council agenda last Friday because the proposal was clearly aimed at benefiting her campaign for State Assembly. The staff report stated:
“by approving the proposed ordinance the City of Santa Ana is removing a restriction, not required under state law that unfairly affects Santa Ana Council candidates running for state or other elected office.”
The continuance of the matter takes a bit of the heat away from Martinez over her poorly timed, and blatantly self-serving, proposal leading up to the primary election.
This is a TEMPORARY VICTORY for our citizens since this will come up again.
Narrow special interest money from CORPORATIONS And UNIONS has been having a corrupting influence on elected officials, as evidenced by the improper/illegal votes taken e.g. by Michelle Martinez and Sal Tinajero.
When this comes up again, a real victory will be to EXTEND The BAN, to prohibit soliciting or receiving funds from after 3-months of their vote, TO 6-MONTHS to A-YEAR From their Vote, or FROM AN ELECTION.
This will strengthen controls and may prevent rewarding politicians for improper behavior, from the quid-pro-quo (“I scratch your back, you scratch my back”) nature of large contributions given with a “wink and a nod” to benefit large donors to the detriment of the interests of our citizens and our community.
Congratulations to the citizens for responding to our call-to-action, and also for the media and bloggers (ie. The Liberal OC, OrangeJuiceBlog, OC Political, and Voice of OC) in being proactive in publicizing this extensively.
I say, It’s time to let politicians and special interests fear us . . . Let’s continue to be mobilized to let them know that while money may buy them politicians, it will not buy them citizens!!!
Francisco Paco Barragán
For State Assembly 2012 – 69th AD
To Restore Our Future Now!
(714) 605-2544 cell
http://www.linkedin.com/in/franciscobarragancpacia
OC Registers Voter Guide – for Francisco
http://www.ocregister.com/news/-351403–.html?appSession=102094073907120&RecordID=93&PageID=3&PrevPageID=2&cpipage=1&CPIsortType=&CPIorderBy=&cbCurrentRecordPosition=1
“Councilman Sal Tinajero has scheduled a meeting of the committee for June 7 to review a sunshine ordinance proposed by a neighborhood coalition to bring greater transparency to City Hall.”
Tinjero and Sarmiento told members of the public at the recent Ethics Committee meeting that the next committee meeting would not take place until AFTER the November 2012 election. I guess that making certain that Michele gets campaign cash shoveled her way is more important than actual Santa Ana City government ethics and transparency.
It is always a “temporary Victory”. Citizen and Community political interests have to remain perpetually engaged as if it was their religion. Activism needs to be their religion.
Voters need to be cautious of any politician that pushes legislation to weaken campaign contribution limits. Money in politics is the reason our country is in the condition it is today! People who truly want to serve our country ought to be pushing for public campaign financing to keep special interests (corporations/unions/mega wealthy) out of our elections.
Joe If this provision would have been removed last night, would Michelle Martinez have enough time to benefit from changing the city law before the June 5th election? and if this was her intent wouldn’t it have made sense to bring this up 5 months ago rather than 30 days before the election?
I guess she isn’t getting the Big IE from
the Pala Indians, and she has to raise money
The ordinance doesn’t constrain City Council members from taking the donations of people who have business before the council. It just constrains them from VOTING ON the proposals involving entities from which they intend to take money. Legislators recuse themselves from voting all the time — what’s the problem?
The problem is that the campaign cash donor is less likely to get the vote they are paying for.