Poor Wendy Greuel, she’s down to the last few hundred bucks in her officeholder account and needs your help to pay some personal office expenses, phone bills and mostly her lawyer-treasurer Stephen Kaufman — the man who connects the dots for so many local and state politicians, unions and special interests.
If you got $500 or $1,000 to throw away, former Mayor Richard Riordan will be hosting a “reception” at 6 p.m. Tuesday for Wendy at his Riordan’s Grill around the corner from his Pantry restaurant downtown. You could be a sponsor yourself for $5,000 and that might even buy you more than the 90 minutes allotted for the anointed next mayor of LA.
Wendy does need your money. She’s raised $688,181.22 for her officeholder account over the last decade but spent even more
$878,382.25, according to city ethics records.
With running for citywide office and the heavy demands of signing off on tepid audits and out-of-date financial advice to deal with the city budget, her fund-raising has fallen off — only raising $25,750.00 last year for her personal slush fund while spending $27,491.67 .
Most of that money — $16,259.56 — went to Kaufman, the election and campaign finance law expert who like the small coterie of insider fund-raisers and political consultants provide the points of connection for money and influence to find each other. Nearly all our city elected officials and even some well-connected wannabes like Mitch Englander, who expects to inherit Greig Smith’s seat without any questions being asked, turn to Kaufman.
City records show Kaufman Downing LLP, his former firm, got paid $1,169,355.66 over the years for their services to city campaigns and officeholders. Even in these tough times, business is picking up for his new firm, Kaufman Legal, which hauled in
$417,050.50 from these same sources.
Even as he was providing his services to the elected officials, Kaufman boasts on his website that he also provides related service to many organizations,
committees & businesses. Among those he cites are Assembly Democratic Caucus,
Conservation Action Fund, California Labor Federation, Central City
Association of Los Angeles, Clear Channel Outdoor, Democratic National
Committee, IBEW Local 11, IBEW Local 18, Los Angeles Area Chamber of
Commerce, Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, Los Angeles
Dodgers, Los Angeles League of Conservation Voters, SEIU Local 6434,
SEIU Local 721, Sierra Club, United Firefighters of Los
Angeles City, United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA), Women’s Political
Committee, Working Californians.
Who says business and labor and environmentalists and politicians don’t mix?
It’s not at all clear what services Kaufman actually does because those don’t have to be reported online beyond saying Wendy’s officeholder account paid him $14,384.56 on Jan. 1 for “professional services” through March 31.
Nice work if you can get it, I’m sure, with so much more to come.
Since becoming mayor, Antonio Villaraigosa has spent $294,177.35 from his officeholder account while raising $259,425.00.
This has allowed him to take billionaire Eli Broad to lunch, pay for his cellphone use and his LA TImes subscription, reimburse Jeff Carr and others for various expenses, spend $3,280.09 for a fund-raiser at the Jonathan Clubs pay $2,000 for Sparkletts and nearly $5,000 for Arrowhead water, presumably because he and his staff don’t like what DWP serves up anymore than the rest of us.
Kaufman did just fine as well with Kaufman Downing getting $90,277.12 and Kaufman Legal taking in $23,702.04. That adds up to $124,000 or nearly half of what was donated to his officeholder account.
You might ask why but that is protected by attorney-client privilege.
This isn’t kids’ games these people are playing, just a fraction of all the millions that come from people and businesses who want all kinds of favors and advantages for their largess.
Money is the name of the game and the return on contributions is often in the range of 100 times or more what the politicians got. It’s all brokered through a narrow circle of operatives that include the lawyers, political operatives and strategists, fund-raisers, lobbyists who pimp the system.
The beauty of it all is the politicians write the rules and appoint the people who enforce them so only fools could ever get caught doing anything wrong and if they do, they just set up a legal defense fund and raise more money.
I’m not going to bore with by reprinting all the provisions of LA Municipal Code SEC. 49.7.12. OFFICEHOLDER CONTROLLED FUNDS.
Suffice it to say, it allows just about anything except what is expressly barred by state law by in SEC. 3: (a) Expenditures in connection with a future election for elective City office; (b) Membership in any athletic, social, fraternal, veteran or religious organization, (c) Supplemental compensation for employees for performance of an act which would be required or expected of the person in the regular course or hours of his or her duties as a City official or employee.
While the complex provisions of city ethics law are a nightmare for ordinary citizens who seek city office, draining their energy and limited resources, they are no problem when you have Kaufman aboard since he probably helped write most of them.
It’s not like the City Ethics staff doesn’t audit the filings but the standard language found in the review in February of Greuel’s officeholder account is this: “The (Greuel) committee did not have any findings that auditors concluded were material.”
It’s not all that easy digging out information about officeholder accounts. You have to go to the City Ethics page, click campaign/elections, click Search Expenditures, and put in the name of the person paid, like Kaufman Legal or Kaufman Downing, and the name of a candidate like Janice Hahn to find out she’s paid him more than $100,000 over the years.
Then, you have to look for which payments came from her officeholder account and look for the little six- or seven-digit number of the account to plug in to the Committee I.D. box when you search just so you can see she paid him $12,683.01 from her officeholder account.
If you want to know how much she’s raised for her officeholder account, go back to where you started but click on Search Contributions, pick out the official, plug in their Committee I.D. so you can learn Janice has raised a total of $677,483.34 for her slush fund during her time in office.
While I’m being so helpful, you can read more about what Kaufman says about his firm:
“Based in Los Angeles, with ties to Sacramento
and Washington D.C.,
Kaufman Legal Group offers a full spectrum of legal services connected
to the political process at the federal, state and local levels.
“In today’s challenging public policy and business environment,
those involved in the political process are subject to increased
scrutiny. Frequently it is not just public officials and candidates
under the microscope, but those who interact with them.
“The firm’s clients include elected officials, candidates, ballot
measure campaigns, corporations, unions, trade associations,
non-profits, major donors, 527 organizations, political parties, PACs,
lobbyists, municipalities and political consultants. Whether working
with a governmental agency or a grass-roots initiative campaign, our
team believes in a collaborative and thoughtful approach that provides
individualized solutions to difficult issues.”.
Here’s who Kaufman cites among
his long list of clients who hold public office: Karen Bass, (former) Speaker of the Assembly,
Barbara Boxer, U.S. Senator, John Chiang, State
Controller, Rocky Delgadillo,
(former) Los Angeles City AttorneyEric Garcetti, Los Angeles City Council
President, Wendy Greuel, Los
Angeles City
Councilmember, Janice Hahn, Los
Angeles City Councilmember,
Jane Harman, U.S. Congresswoman,Jose
Huizar, Los Angeles City Councilmember,
Alex Padilla, State Senator,
John A. Perez, State Assemblymember
(Speaker), Jan Perry, Los Angeles
City Councilmember, Mark Ridley-Thomas, Los Angeles County
Supervisor, Bill Rosendahl, Los
Angeles City
Councilmember, Greig
Smith, Los Angeles City Councilmember, Antonio R. Villaraigosa, Mayor, City of Los
Angeles, Maxine Waters, U.S.
Congresswoman.
Among the
ballot measures he cites are Yes on Measure R (2008
County Transportation
Measure), Yes on Measure J (2008 L.A.
Community College
District Bond Measure), Yes on Proposition R (2006 L.A. City Term
Limits & Ethics Reform Measure), Yes on Proposition O (2004 L.A. City Clean
Water Measure).
Among the organizations,
committees & businesses he cites are Assembly Democratic Caucus,
Conservation Action Fund, California Labor Federation, Central City
Association of Los Angeles, Clear Channel Outdoor, Democratic National
Committee, IBEW Local 11, IBEW Local 18, Los Angeles Area Chamber of
Commerce, Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, Los Angeles
Dodgers, Los Angeles League of Conservation Voters, SEIU Local 6434,
SEIU Local 721, Sierra Club, United Firefighters of Los
Angeles City, United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA), Women’s Political
Committee, Working Californians.