The Citizens Clean Elections Commission has rejected a proposal that would allow up to three candidates to use a single form to qualify for public campaign funding.

Attorneys Lee Miller and Tim La Sota of the Phoenix firm of Miller, LaSota & Peters have been advocating creation of the new form for several months as a way to streamline qualifying for public campaign funding.

The Arizona Secretary of State’s Office, though, said the state Clean Elections Act would have to be amended to make such a change, and, in any case, would create a “logistical nightmare” for elections officials trying to validate the forms.

And one critic of the proposal has said it’s aimed at serving only one candidate, an allegation that one of the promoters of denies.

Candidates for state offices who want to qualify for public campaign funding have to collect a certain number of $5 contributions from registered voters. The number varies depending on the office being sought. A candidate must document each $5 contribution that is submitted to the Secretary of State’s Office, which verifies that the contribution is from a registered voter.

Proposal: 3 Candidates Per Form

Since public campaign funding became available, beginning with the 2000 election, only one candidate can be listed on each form. Mr. Miller and Mr. La Sota are now proposing that up to three candidates may be listed on one form, provided that the candidates are all of the same political party. Candidates for the Legislature would have to all be running in the same legislative district. The two attorneys are proposing that candidates for the Arizona Corporation Commission be the only candidates for statewide offices allowed to use the multi-candidate forms.

“This is something that would be of particular interest to legislative candidates,” Mr. La Sota said Oct. 22, the day after the Clean Elections Commission voted unanimously to table the proposal.

Mr. La Sota said the biggest impediment to running with public money is collecting the qualifying contributions. In the 2004 election, a candidate for the Legislature will have to collect 210 $5 qualifying contributions, while a candidate for the Corporation Commission will have to collect 1,575 $5 qualifying contributions.

Allowing up to three candidates for those offices to use a single form will make qualifying easier and more efficient for those who want to run as a slate, which happens most often in races for the Legislature and the Corporation Commission, Mr. La Sota said.

Under his proposal, the candidates using the multi-candidate forms would have to decide among themselves who would submit the original qualifying forms to the Secretary of State’s Office, while the other one or two candidates would submit photocopies of the forms.

Secretary Of State Has ‘Reservations’

But Secretary of State Jan Brewer, whose office oversees state elections, said such forms would be both a practical problem and would conflict with the statutory requirement.

“After reviewing this question, my office has very serious reservations about such a change in the qualifying of contribution forms and believes strongly that such a change could require statutory changes,” Mrs. Brewer stated in a letter to the commission, dated Aug. 15. Such a change also would “…lead to a huge logistical nightmare in carrying out the duties of the Secretary of State during this process.”

According to ARS 16-950, a candidate wishing to qualify for public funding “…must tender to the Secretary of State the original reporting slips identified in section 16-946, subsection C …,” the section of the statute that describes the contribution qualifying forms.

“Accordingly, my office is only authorized to accept reporting slips and not copies of any reporting slips,” Ms. Brewer’s letter states. “Therefore, it will be impossible for three candidates to be listed on a single reporting slip and for all three to receive credit because not all three candidates will be able to submit to my office original reporting slips.”

Mr. La Sota said, though, that under his proposal, the Secretary of State’s Office would still receive the original forms; the copies would merely simplify the verification process for each of the candidates.

Jessica Funkhouser, a former state elections director who is now an assistant state attorney general who advises the Clean Elections Commission, agreed with Ms. Brewer’s position during the Oct. 21 meeting of the commission. The commission then voted 4-0 to table the proposal. The fifth commissioner, Kathleen Detrick, was absent from the meeting.

Campaign Is Aimed At Getting Gleason Back On ACC, 1 Critic Says

After the meeting, Barbara Lubin, executive director of the Clean Elections Institute, criticized the proposed multi-candidate form as a vehicle for helping the re-election efforts of Arizona Corporation Commissioner Mike Gleason.

Mr. Gleason, a Republican, initially intended in 2000 to run with public campaign funds, but then later decided to instead collect traditional private campaign contributions.

“This is the ‘Let’s get Gleason elected’ form,” Ms. Lubin said. “He couldn’t or wouldn’t qualify for Clean Elections money, so now he wants to ride the coattails” of fellow Republican Corporation Commission members Bill Mundell and Jeff Hatch-Miller, Ms. Lubin said.

Mr. La Sota denied the proposal is aimed at helping one candidate.

Mr. Gleason “obviously didn’t qualify for Clean Elections funds, but it turned out he didn’t need them,” Mr. La Sota said. “One of the things that we’re trying to do is increase participation, so it’s disappointing that a group that is touting Clean Elections would be opposed to something that would help meet that goal.”

Lawyer Wants Issue Reconsidered

Mr. La Sota said he intends to try to get the Clean Elections Commission to reconsider the multi-candidate form.

“It’s not a legal impediment to implementing this; it’s more of a logistical challenge,” Mr. La Sota said. Adopting the multi-candidate form “may take some adjusting on the part of the Clean Elections Commission and the Secretary of State’s Office. But we don’t make the rules for the umpires, we make the rules for the players. If there’s a change that can increase participation, the agencies ought to accept it, and just say, ‘That’s life.’” —