Future Dims for Publicly Funded Elections

Public campaign financing in New Hampshire will likely be off the table after yesterday’s Republican resurgence at the State House. The Citizen Funded Election Task Force is due to issue its final recommendations Nov. 15, but they may not get any traction due to budgetary and political priorities.

Created in 2009 — in part by the prodding of the late campaign finance reform activist Doris “Granny D” Haddock — the task force is scheduled for its final meeting on Nov. 10. According to the political watchdog group Common Cause, 14 states have some level of public financing for statewide and local legislative offices, including Arizona and Maine.

Sen. Martha Fuller Clark (D-Portsmouth) and Rep. Jim Splaine (D-Portsmouth) are two of the most prominent supporters of publicly funded elections on the task force. Neither will be around next year to push for any of the task force’s potential legislative recommendations. Clark was defeated in her reelection bid and Splaine declined to run.

History

The task force was a compromise after the last significant effort at public financing failed. In December 2008, The Commission to Study the Feasibility of Public Funding of State Election Campaigns recommended that candidates for state senate, governor or executive council receive matching funds after collecting a certain amount of donations from supporters. The commission estimated this would cost $6.5 million annually.

They suggested funding it through a wide range of sources, including:

• a special “first in the nation” license plate
• a voluntary check-off box on tax returns
• increased fees to register as a lobbyist
• higher car rental taxes
• a surcharge on criminal fines
• a fee on plastic grocery bags.

The commission also proposed setting up a pilot program in six senate districts for three election cycles, at a cost of about $750,000. But, efforts to pass a Citizen Funded Elections Act were derailed in part by the economic downturn.

In 2000, Senate Bill 447 to establish voluntary public financing of campaigns lost narrowly in the House, and a similar initiative two years later, Senate Bill 335, was also defeated.

At the national level, the Fair Elections Now Act has not made it out of the House. It was co-sponsored it 2009 by departing Rep. Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH), along with 164 other legislators.

The direction of campaign finance reform and publicly funded elections was further muddied by the landmark Supreme Court “Citizen’s United” decision earlier this year, which opened the path for corporate and union election spending that had been prohibited since 1907.

>> The final regular meeting of the Citizen-funded Election Task Force will take place in Room 103 at the State House on Wednesday, Nov. 10, at 3 p.m.

This Daily Update was written by Michael McCord with contributions from Hilary Niles.

Posted by Hilary Niles on Nov 3 2010. Filed under elections, ethics, Government, lobbying, Money, state budget, taxes, Weekly Briefing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry