Irvine tracks campaign donations online. The most interesting filings come at the end (or later), but let’s start to “follow the money”
(Photo Credit: GavelGrab.org)
The Agran (Democratic) slate is off to a strong start.
Larry Agran so far has been self funding, giving his campaign $9,500 on August 14, $50,000 on August 20, and $40,000 on September 16.
Melissa Fox has been hard at work, raising $25,234 in individual contributions, including $13,128 raised in the first half of 2014. Her three dozen donors span the usual Agran coalition including Anne Getty Earhart, School Board Member Carolyn Inmon, CAIR-CA, and a handful of unions. I can’t assess how many donors are from Irvine because the addresses have been redacted.
Stephen Choi raised $23,681 in the first half of the year from 71 listed donors, of whom only 34 have Irvine addresses. While many of those out-of-town contributions are from the “Korean diaspora”, the out-of-town names include many Builders, Investors, and Developers. Indeed, the Strader family appears “all-in” for Choi.
Evan Chemers has given $17,900 to his campaign, but does not appear to have raised any outside money.
Katherine Daigle, Mary Ann Gaido, Jeff Lalloway and Lynn Schott have yet to file anything interesting that I can find.
The Choi (Republican) slate is matching Larry’s personal contribution with OC GOP money. Lysa Ray, who works with Republicans such as Stephen Choi and John Duong, has been busy. The Irvine Neighbors for Great Park Reform-Yes on V and the Irvine Neighbors for Term Limits – Yes on W each received $40,000 from the Republican Central Committee of Orange. Lysa also filed a Form 402 Statement of Termination for the Great Irvine Voter Education Guide, so hopefully that’s one less slate mailer cluttering my mail box.
Neither Irvine Community News and Views, which has mailed-out the Pro-Agran faux newspaper for the past five consecutive weeks, nor the opposing Taxpayers for Ethical Government have filed with the city, county, or state yet. On past experience, neither side will make their disclosures easily searchable.
Irvine campaign finance rules drive an odd quirk: wise politicos keep old campaigns committees alive but heavily in debt so that a donor can make the max contribution to multiple committees.
As best as I can decode the myriad Form 460 filings, as of June 30th Jeff Lalloway has one committee with $15,364 of debt, Beth Krom has one committee with $5,926 of debt (a second committee carrying about $7,000 appears to have closed during the spring), and Evan Chemers has one old committee alive but debt free. Larry Agran has seven (or eight) committees carrying $733,134 of debt. I couldn’t find old committees for Daigle, Shea, or Choi.
Like so much else in Irvine politics, “everybody does it,” but Larry does it better.
I collect and collate this data manually, so omissions and mistakes are inevitable. I welcome any and all corrections or additions.
*Good Work Tyler. One word of advice. Even in years when those NOT up for re-election…….they get money into their campaign coffers. It is always good to check the input to the entire sitting council ….while you are at it. You learn so much about how the bad guys work their magic.