[Mpls] Money Trails

[Greg Abbott]

There are non-trivial First Amendment problems with this proposal,  
not the least of which is defining what an interest group is.  Should  
someone who takes support from, say Progressive Minnesota, be banned  
from voting on the whole range of public issues that PM has taken a  
position on?

The better approach is public financing of local elections, so that  
candidates do not have to deal with interest groups as a prerequisite  
to running.  You could structure it very much like the state system,  
hopefully more robust, where once a candidate reaches a certain  
triggering threshold of small, individual contributions, they qualify  
for public funds -- and the candidate's acceptance of such funds  
would bind them to an overall limit on the amount of money to be  
spent in the race.  That limit could be waived if another candidate  
in the race refused to agree to public funding and/or a spending cap.

I know this idea is a hard sell during tough financial times for the  
city, but it's the only viable alternative to developer-financed  
local elections that I see.


On Dec 5, 2005, at 5:12 AM, Wendy Wilde wrote:

>>>> Voluntary recusal would be a great start.  David Brauer Kingfield
>
> Mandatory recusal.  You take money from an interest group to fun  
> for office,
> you cannot vote on projects for them.  Make it law.  And cannot  
> take a job
> from them for 10 years after leaving office.
>

Greg Abbott
Linden Hills