The nation’s top court issued a temporary emergency order Tuesday preventing candidates and elected officials who use Arizona’s public financing system from receiving matching funds to keep up with opponents who haven’t opted into the system, the Los Angeles Times tells us.

The order likely will stay in place through the fall — and Arizona’s Aug. 24 primary election — until the court hears a case challenging Arizona’s matching-funds provision.

The ruling has potential serious ramifications beyond Arizona’s borders as supporters and opponents of publicly financed elections look on from across the nation.

This week’s emergency order by the U.S. Supreme Court, issued by five justices, also appears to be another sign of the skepticism by the court’s conservative justices of “legal rules to limit election spending or to equalize the spending between wealthy and not-so-wealthy candidates,” according to the paper.

Earlier this year the Supreme Court struck down a federal law banning spending by corporations — and by extension labor unions — in its Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission ruling. The court’s five conservative justices said, in essence, that the law banning corporate spending in certain situations restricted free speech.

This week’s emergency order from the nation’s top court addresses a separate issue and strikes deep at Arizona’s attempt to even the odds when a publicly financed candidate is being heavily outspent by an opponent who has not opted into the state’s public financing system.

The timing of the court’s ruling this week surprised many, with some noting the unprecedented nature of the court’s action and others giving the court plaudits for protecting free speech rights.

“I’m extremely disappointed. To take an action such as this so late in the election cycle is unprecedented. Matching funds result in more speech and political debate, not less,” the Times quoted Todd Lang, executive director of Arizona’s Citizens Clean Elections Commission, as saying.

William Maurer, executive director of the Institute for Justice, meanwhile, told the Times that the decision “will allow the 2010 Arizona election to occur without the government placing its thumb on the scale in favor of those politicians who receive public funding.”

Beyond the broader philosophical and policy questions raised by the court’s order this week’s action poses severe practical consequences for Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, who opted into the public financing system and is being outspent by her GOP primary opponent — wealthy businessman Owen “Buz” Mills, the Times tells us.

Mills has spent $2 million so far on his campaign.

According to the Times:

Brewer had agreed to public funding and was to receive $707,000 for her campaign. She was also eligible to receive up to $1.4 million in extra matching funds because Mills had vastly outspent her. The Supreme Court’s order means she will not receive the extra money this month.

Today, we have news that Chavez’s employee relations director, Lawrence Torres, will keep his $81,000 salary even after he moves back to the Open Space Division as a public safety officer.

Torres had been a loyal employee for Chavez, collecting more contributions for the mayor’s public financing bid than any other city worker.

The Independent took note of Torres earlier this year, in a story about the degree to which city employees helped Chavez qualify for public financing of his campaign for reelection. Our analysis showed that at least 52 percent of the qualifying contributions Chavez needed were collected by city hall workers.  In his role as employee relations director and prior to that as a union representative, Torres was in direct contact with the city’s work force. He ultimately filled ten contribution books for the mayor, for a total of 250 contributions. This put him well ahead of his fellow workers in the effort he made to help Chavez qualify for the public funds.

Under an October 26 agreement signed by outgoing Chief Administrative Officer Ed Adams, Torres continue to make $81,000 per year, rather than the usual salary for that position, which is about $30,000 lower. His high salary will boost the value of any unused leave he cashes out when he retires, this week, according to the Albuquerque Journal.

Former CAO Ed Adams also transferred to a lower position in another department while keeping his high salary. As the city’s top administrative officer, Adams made $147,000, a salary he continues to make as a project manager in the Municipal Development Department. That agreement was made in 2006, though, well before Chavez lost the 2009 election.

Richard "R.J." Berry at a press conference outside city hall.

Albuquerque’s municipal elections are supposed to be non-partisan, but in this year’s mayoral race, the Republican Party has supported one particular candidate, two-term State Rep. Richard Berry, R-Albuquerque.

The party has helped Berry with canvassing and volunteer labor, and Berry has used telephone lines and a copy machine at the state party headquarters, according to Berry campaign manager Dana Feldman.

“Any expenses incurred have been paid for by the campaign. The county party formed a measure finance committee to provide help with canvassing and volunteers for the qualification phase. The campaign reported that as an in-kind contribution,” Feldman wrote in an e-mail to the Independent.

While  Albuquerque municipal elections are intended to be non-partisan, legally there is a gray area.

“[Nonpartisan] means we don’t go through the primary process [or] have party candidates on the ballot,” said Albuquerque’s city clerk, Randy Autio.

There is no law against participation by political parties. But if a party wants to work in support of or against a candidate, it must register as a measure finance committee, which is the city’s version of a political action committee, or PAC.

There is a measure finance committee registered for the Republican Party, called RPNM No New Taxes, according to Autio.

Autio says he has fielded some questions about whether the Republican party is working on behalf of Richard Berry and Daniel Lewis, who is challenging incumbent City Councilor Michael Cadigan for his west side seat, in an appropriate manner. But so far, no formal complaints have been filed with the Board of Ethics, Autio said.

The Albuquerque Journal editorialized against the GOP helping Berry, saying it violated the intent–if not the letter–of the law.

Autio said his office is looking into how Republican dollars have been spent through various measure finance committees to make sure everything is legit.

“People can claim their party affiliation as an asset of theirs and it can be used for or against them,” he said. “If you get a call from someone who says “vote for so and so, and he’s a Republican,” unless the party sponsored the calls and paid for them, it’s not the party doing it.”

GOP paid for polling about mayor’s race

In December 2008, the Republican Party funded a poll that included questions about the Albuquerque mayoral race.

The party gave State Senator John Ryan a $17,000 contribution and that same month, he commissioned a poll that included the mayor’s race. In Ryan’s words, it was “a question about the favorability of Marty Chavez and the name IDs for a handful of other local officials and politicians.”

Did that poll encourage Berry to join the race?

Feldman says no. Berry had not seen the results of Sen. Ryan’s poll,  the poll did not inform his decision to run for mayor, she said. She also said that Berry was not recruited by the Republican Party to run for mayor.

Senator Ryan told the Independent that he did not share the results of the poll he conducted with Berry, but that the state Republican Party did see the results.

“I’m positive that I shared the issue questions with the party, as we were preparing for the [legislative] session,” Ryan said.

State Republican Party spokesperson Janel Causey said that she couldn’t be sure because at the time the state Republican Party was under the direction of a different administration, but that the results were “probably” shared with the party by Ryan.

According to Ryan, the poll was primarily about issues pertinent to the legislative session held a few months later, and that just one out of “about 40 questions” was about Mayor Martin Chavez’s favorability. The poll was conducted in his district because of the demographics, he said.

“One thing you have to remember is that my district is a swing district that looks similar to the state as a whole, demographically,” he said.

The Republican poll was conducted in the month preceding the cut-off date for spending money outside the public financing system, which all three candidates elected to use. They each received $328,000 in public funds to run their campaigns.

Publicly financed candidates are barred from spending additional funds as of January 1. But according to Autio, the law doesn’t address what funds are spent prior to that date.

On the other hand, he’s also said that “there’s a fixed amount of money that everyone should be spending,” and that the fair market value of some items should be reported.

“If you have something that was paid for through previous political activity, I think you’ll have to reflect that coming in by listing the fair market value of what the prior campaign gave to this campaign,” he said. “Using public financing, you can only do that through an in-kind donation.”

As I wrote on my blog the other day, what bothers me the most about the Block case is not the theft of which the father and son are accused, but the underlying problems with New Mexico politics that the case throws into high relief.

New Mexico has public financing of state elections. This means that Jerome Block, Jr., an uninspiring candidate by all accounts — and one who nearly lost to a Green Party opponent in a County where Democrats pretty much never lose to anybody of any party — got to run for and win a cushy government job with taxpayers’ money.

The penny-ante larceny of which Jerome Block, Jr., is accused is small potatoes when compared with the great, hulking pork roast that is the public financing of campaigns.  The few thousand dollars Jerome Block allegedly stole from his campaign funds is far less significant than the millions of dollars New Mexico extracts — with perfect legality — from the taxpayers to fund candidates like Block in elections all over the state.  That is the theft we should be angry about.

I understand the rationale behind public financing of elections. It is supposed to reduce the influence of the wealthy in politics, and give ordinary citizens the chance to run for public office. It is supposed to give us better candidates, and better government. But does it?  In the case of the Public Regulation Commission race, it gave us Jerome Block, Jr.

The same noble spirit of reform that brought us public financing has, in the 2009 legislative session, brought the citizens of New Mexico campaign contribution limits. This state law, just like the McCain-Feingold law on the federal level, limits the amount an individual can contribute to a candidate’s campaign coffers, and is supposed to reduce the influence of money in politics and give us better government.

Does it?  I have seen no improvement in the quality of our elected officials in the years since McCain-Feingold passed, nor any diminution in the influence of moneyed interests on politics.  The money just gets there in other ways.  Contriubutions to individual candidates are limited, but not contributions to political parties, so that the power of the national parties has increased.  This, of course, means more well-connected party insiders as candidates, and fewer outsiders and ordinary citizens. 

Mr. Smith would have a very hard time getting to Washington these days.

Contribution limits also mean that if candidates want to win the next election, they must begin their scrounging for campaign dollars the minute the last election is over. Does that give us better government?

It is naive to think that the influence of money can be taken out of politics.  Money and political power are inextricably linked.  They always have been and always will be.  Throughout most of human history, that linkage has been straightforward.

In the Roman Republic, for example, political magistracies were the exclusive province of the wealthy.  Candidates financed their own elections, and served in office without payment. Moreover, magistrates spent their own money repairing roads, building aqueducts and putting on public entertainments.

Today, in times that purport to be more enlightened, candidates spend money forcibly extracted from taxpayers to fund their campaigns, are paid more taxpayer money in salary, and spend still more taxpayer money on public works projects once they are in office.

Are we better served by our representatives than the Romans were by theirs?

Sometimes I wonder.

ABQ mayoral hopefuls Richard Romero and R.J. Berry at their joint press conference yesterday

ALBUQUERQUE — Two of Albuquerque’s three ballot-qualified mayoral candidates called on incumbent Mayor Martin Chavez to refrain from appearing in any taxpayer-funded advertisements from now through the municipal election on October 6.

The request was issued at an unusual joint press conference Monday afternoon on Civic Plaza featuring candidates Richard “R.J.” Berry and Richard Romero. Both argued that ads featuring Chavez — an unannounced candidate for reelection — violate the spirit of the city’s new public financing system and its aim of leveling the campaign playing field among the candidates.

Meanwhile, at the City Council’s regularly scheduled meeting last night, a unanimous council voted to slash the city advertising budget — affecting ads that likely would have prominently featured the mayor.

Chavez, along with Berry, a tw0-term Republican state representative, and Romero, the former Democratic leader of the New Mexico Senate, have all received about $328,000 in public funds for their bids for mayor.

While Chavez has not formally declared his candidacy, he did sue to have the city’s mayoral term limits overturned, and his political organization collected sufficient petition signatures and small contributions to qualify for the ballot as well as public financing.

Berry and Romero argued at their joint press conference yesterday that it’s clear Chavez is a candidate even if he hasn’t announced, and that recent taxpayer-funded television ads featuring him amount to electioneering.

“These ads are thinly disguised campaign ads. The mayor already has more than $300,000 in the bank. … This is just a way for the mayor to use even more taxpayer money in an election year,” Berry said.

Romero described the ads as “double-dipping.”

“The mayor, through a series of TV ads, is using the city treasury to unfairly and unethically promote himself during an election year,” Romero added. “He’s qualified for public financing, but instead of announcing he’s a candidate and spending his campaign funds, he’s double-dipping on the backs of taxpayers.”

Deborah James, the mayor’s spokeswoman, disagreed. She told the Independent that for Chavez to adopt a prominent public profile is not out of the ordinary.

“For his entire career Mayor Chavez has been an outspoken leader,” James said. “All of a sudden there’s this suggestion that he’s being more vocal than normal, now. But that’s not true. All you have to do is look at his history, he’s been out front and center from well before.”

James said one of the ads in question, about dangers posed to children from Internet stalkers, is part of an initiative that started over a year ago when the city partnered with the FBI cybercrimes department to tackle the problem. The ad is part of a strategy to get the city’s message out, she said.

Berry countered that while cyberstalking is a serious problem, television ads featuring an all-but-announced candidate for office amount to manipulation. Other city officials could just as easily be featured in them, he added.

This is a screen capture from a taxpayer-funded ad featuring ABQ Mayor Martin Chavez

“The advertisements tackle the tough issue of Internet predators, an issue that we all should take action against,” Berry said. “Today I am asking that the city remove the mayor from the ads. He is manipulating this important issue and using taxpayer dollars to gain exposure in an election year.”

The allegation that Chavez is exploiting the city’s advertising budget for political gain has surfaced before. In 2005, he was criticized by his opponents for the striking similarity between his campaign billboards and city billboards touting city-financed bond projects across Albuquerque.

Media articles at the time had similar rebuttals from the Chavez camp, with James quoted in the June 15, 2005 Albuquerque Journal as saying “public service announcements” featuring the mayor were nothing out of the ordinary for Chavez.

“We’ve been doing this since he took office,” she said at the time. “Every mayor has a responsibility to call the community to action, and no one has been more successful than Mayor Chávez.”

She was also quoted saying the Chavez administration would “adhere to the city’s 90-day policy to pull back public-service announcements before the election.”

In response to Berry and Romero yesterday, James again said the Chavez camp would follow the rules and pull back from appearances by the mayor in city advertising campaigns in the three months prior to the election.

Ultimately, James noted, Chavez is the “only mayor the city has” and he’s within his rights under the current city charter rules.

Nonetheless, Romero said such responses ring hollow. He says the problem was recognized by the City Council after the 2005 election, when it amended the city charter to make the rules more stringent as a result of “Mayor Chavez cross-marketing his campaign materials with official city business such as road projects.”

Romero charges that Chavez’s current actions represent more of the same.

“Our new campaign laws are supposed to level the playing field,” he added. “But, typical of Marty, he’s skirting the rules and exploiting loopholes.”

In the end, Romero and Berry’s concerns may be partially addressed by the City Council’s actions last night to eliminate much of the city’s advertising from the 2010 operating budget, which takes effect on July 1. The move slashed the entire advertising budget for the environmental health department, in whose ads the mayor often appears.

Chavez: non-candidate candidate

It’s final — three candidates have qualified for public financing in Albuquerque’s 2009 mayor’s race.

State Rep. Richard Berry — the only Republican in the field of candidates — qualified for the funds yesterday, which was the deadline for turning in 3,287 $5 contributions from registered voters in the city.

In a statement, Berry said he was “greatly humbled” by the support he received from family, friends and volunteers in the quest to gather the contributions, which provided “incredible” momentum to his campaign. He then gave an indication of the themes of his campaign:

Our momentum going into this campaign is incredible. Albuquerque is ready for a fresh start. This city is ready for a mayor who will bring a business-like approach and common sense to City Hall and who understands that accountability to the taxpayer is paramount. As mayor, I will work diligently on behalf of all Albuquerque citizens.

In a report sent at the end of business yesterday to the three candidates who qualified for public financing, the city clerk’s office gave the most current number of contributions turned in.

So far, former New Mexico Senate President Pro Tem Richard Romero has turned in 5,025 contributions, and the city has verified that 3,524 of those are from registered Albuquerque voters.

Mayor Martin Chavez, the only candidate to qualify who hasn’t officially announced his intention to run for what would be a fourth term, has turned in 5,179, and the city has verified 3,523 of those.

And Berry has turned in 4,793 contributions, and the clerk has verified 3,523.

Candidates had until midnight yesterday — March 31 — to turn in contributions, so there may be a few more turned in.

While the race to get the contributions turned in within a six-week period of time has attracted some attention, its not the only hurdle candidates have to jump.

The $5 contributions are what qualify a candidate for public financing, and they will get their distribution of roughly $328,000 in public funds on Friday.

But they also have to gather petition signatures from 2 percent of registered voters in the city — about 6,500 — by the end of April to get on the Oct. 6 ballot. In this quest, they join a handful of candidates who have declared they’ll run as privately financed candidates. These include Rob Dickson, James Thomas, Rudolph Serrano and Donna Rowe.

Illustration by Keith Lewis

Former state Senate President Pro Tem Richard Romero has turned in enough $5 qualifying contributions to receive public funds for his candidacy in the Albuquerque mayoral race this year, the city clerk confirmed to his campaign today.As of last Friday, Romero had turned in 4,034 contributions, surpassing by a comfortable margin the 3,287 contributions needed to qualify. His campaign released a statement today saying that he will turn in close to 5,000 by the deadline, which is at 5 p.m. tomorrow.

Romero, a Democrat, will also submit almost 5,000 of the 6,574 petition signatures, which are required by April 28.

“Our Campaign for Change has been embraced by the voters as we’ve now surpassed our first major milestone — thanks to a army of fantastic volunteers,” Romero said in the statement. “Day after day, our grassroots momentum has been building — and it will continue to build right on till Election Day in October.”

Romero is a former school teacher and was also president pro tem of the New Mexico Senate from 2001 to 2004. He’s from Albuquerque’s Barelas neighborhood, and currently lives in downtown Albuquerque.

One other candidate, state Rep. Richard Berry, an Albuquerque Republican, is nearing the qualifying goal to receive public financing in the race. Mayor Marty Chavez, a Democrat, has already met the requirement, but hasn’t said whether he’ll actually run for a fourth term.

Other potential candidates who will be self-financed are Rob Dickson, James Thomas, Rudolph Serrano and Donna Rowe.

The deadline for turning in the required contributions from 1 percent of the electorate — which is about 3,280 people — is tomorrow, and both GOP state Rep. Richard Berry as well as former state Senate President Pro Tem Richard Romero, a Democrat, are pretty much there.

The city clerk’s office worked through Saturday to stay on top of verifying that the contributions turned in last week actually come from registered voters.

As of late Saturday afternoon, Romero had turned in 4,034 contributions, and Berry had turned in 3,462. The clerk is in the process of verifying the contributions, but with an error rate of 12 percent, Romero is pretty much over the hump. Berry’s error rate 10 percent, so he has just a little further to go. Both candidates will likely continue to collect contributions straight through to the Tuesday deadline.

Once the deadline passes, the clerk’s office verifies that each candidate turned in enough contributions from registered voters. The candidates are also required to turn in their final “seed money” reports. The seed money could be collected in sums of $100 or less from Jan. 1 through to March 31st.

Once the clerk certifies that the candidates meet the requirements, they will get a distribution on Friday of $1 per registered voter in the city, minus the seed money they collected. That means each will get between $300,000 and $328,000.

After Friday, they also still have to turn in petition signatures from 2 percent of the registered voters in the city. The signature gathering is already under way, but if for some reason one of the candidates couldn’t meet the late April deadline for the signatures, they’d have to give the public funds back to the city.

Mayor Marty Chavez has already turned in enough $5 contributions and petition signatures to qualify for public financing, but he hasn’t formally declared that he’ll be running for mayor again. Nonetheless, he’ll be qualified to receive that big chunk of public change on Friday, along with the other two.

Unlike other candidates, Berry had not turned in any contributions to the city clerk’s office, and his campaign wasn’t offering any number as late as yesterday, when the Independent called to inquire.

But today, the Berry campaign turned in about 1,800 individual contributions, the city clerk’s office said, putting Berry within range of meeting the required numbers by the deadline — which is March 31.

Berry’s campaign manager, Dana Feldman, told the Independent that Berry has “dozens and dozens” of volunteers and that the campaign has also hired canvassers. Some are students on spring break, she said, and others are people who’ve come from outside the state to help Berry’s campaign, she acknowledged.

A measure finance committee has been set up in recent weeks explicitly for the purpose of electing Berry. The original listed purpose of the committee, called the Committee to Promote Integrity in City Politics, was to elect Richard Berry. That purpose has now been changed to “assist in electing city officials.” It was formed March 9 by Ryan Cangliosi, who heads up the New Mexico GOP.

This sort of committee is essentially the city’s version of political action committees. If such a committee spends money to help a specific candidate get elected, the public financing rules allow other candidates in the race to get matching funds up to that amount from the city. The first reports from measure finance committees are due July 17.

It’s unclear if Berry’s campaign has paid the canvassers, which would have to come from seed money collected by the campaign since January 1, or if the committee is hiring the canvassers. Feldman refused to give details about how many paid canvassers are collecting for Berry, or who was paying them. The campaign does have one full-time staff member, she said.

Another measure finance committee was also set up in March. Citizens for Albuquerque was formed March 18 by Don Kaufman, with the purpose of “informing people about Albuquerque government.”

The deadline for gathering the contributions from one percent of the electorate — 3,280 people — is March 31.

Romero has so far turned in 2,110 of that total, and 1,787 have been verified by the city clerk as coming from registered voters. Today, his campaign turned in 1,000.

Neri Holguin, Romero’s campaign manager, said the campaign is focused and methodically meeting its goals.

“We’ll turn in another 1,000 next week,” she said, “and then probably another 400 or so by the deadline.”

The campaigns goal is to turn in a little more than 4,000 to account for a natural error rate, she said.