Legislators should not pull plug on electronic campaign finance reports
In the last two weeks, a bill to ease the electronic reporting requirements of candidates with the Alaska Public Offices Commission has been introduced and moved to the verge of final passage in both houses.
Lawmakers of both parties want to allow state candidates who do not have a home computer or high-speed Internet access to avoid the electronic reporting requirement for campaign finance documents and file paper reports instead.
They also want to allow everyone to file documents the old-fashioned way for the 2012 election.
To top it off, the Senate added a ridiculous "geezer amendment" that would allow incumbents to keep filing paper reports as long as they run for office.
This unseemly haste about a measure to limit public access is the sign that something is wrong.
It has all the appearance of an attempt to sneak the bill through before anyone notices. Legislators say their speed was all about getting a change made before the first Feb. 15 APOC report that some of them have to file.
There are onerous tasks associated with running for state office, but electronic filing with the APOC is not one of them.
Any candidate for the Legislature in any part of Alaska who cannot figure out how to file electronically doesn't deserve to be in the Legislature.
Incumbent legislators say they are not allowed to use state computers to file campaign statements and that they would be forced to go to the public library to complete the task if they do not have their own personal computers. Some did not bring private computers with them to Juneau.
If they must, legislators should change the law to allow themselves and others to use state-owned computers to file these documents. That would be better than the course they have chosen.
Sen. Gary Stevens, president of the Senate, said that an APOC attorney was supposed to get back to him and answer the question of whether legislators, for this one time, could use state computers to file forms.
"She said, "I will get back to you on that.' She's never gotten back to me on that," he said.
Our legislators are under the impression that this electronic filing requirement is inconvenient.
The concern about convenience is misplaced.
The reason for this change—endorsed by the Legislature five years back— is to make it convenient for the public to learn about candidates for office when it is most important, which is just before an election when the money flow is at its fastest.
Allowing candidates more latitude to avoid electronic filing makes the APOC more inefficient, wastes state money and is inconvenient for the public.
Most important of all, it delays the dissemination of campaign finance data at a critical moment. This has the effect of limiting public access to campaign finance reports. While the rules require that paper reports be typed or printed in a legible manner, there have been many instances in the past where campaign documents were not legible. When handwriting is poor, the reader is often unable to identify a campaign contributor or a campaign expense listed on a form.
The original bill two weeks ago said that paper reports would have to be posted on the Internet in 10 days. That's enough of a delay to allow some reports to be released after an election when they are of little use.
Legislators should reverse course on this bill.
They should focus instead on working with the APOC to make the system more convenient for the public. Some lawmakers say they didn't know they would have to file electronically, the new system is hard to figure out, the software is not user-friendly, the rules on using state computers are a problem and the penalties for simple mistakes—up to $50 a day or $500 a day in some cases—are excessive.
The APOC began training sessions in Anchorage in December, so lawmakers should not have been taken by surprise.
The Legislature should deal with the penalties, if necessary, by reducing the fines for simple mistakes and keeping the electronic filing requirement for 2012.
The Legislators do not want us to know who is funding them. I found that the oil companies and nonunion oil company contractors overwhelmingly fund the Republicans.
And who in the legislature does not have a computer and Internet access? Give us a break, anyone with a lick of sense as these.
The APOC database is still not online but is available for $5 from APOC. They send it by US Mail! The searchable files at the APOC website is a joke.
From the pay raise scheme which they cleverly devised so they could pass blame on legislative pay raises.. to bills like this. It's clear that a state wide citizens initiative needs to be passed that "any bill or law being considered, that directly affects governing, restricting, or compensations of legislators, must be put to a vote of the people".
It seems more and more, they are intent on passing bills that further add shadows to the finnances, leaving more places for corruption to occur. The more complicated the system, the easier to hide corruption.
It's also becomming clear that since they haven't done ANYTHING substancial, we need to cote a whole new lot of legislators in office.
Too bad the only way to get elected into office, is by having deep pockets, or having deep pocketed sponsors. He who can buy the most ads, and the best Public Relations or Campaign Managers, win.