Payments to Wife, Aide of Campbell Spur FPPC Review

State Sen. William Campbell’s conference on women paid $165,000 to a firm owned by the senator’s wife and one of his top aides to organize the meeting for 14,000 women last year in Anaheim, state records show.

The payments, which represented more than one-third of the conference’s total expenses, have prompted the state Fair Political Practices Commission and the attorney general’s office to review the conference’s relationship with Campbell’s wife, Margene, and his Orange County field coordinator, Karen L. Smith.

And an official of the federal Small Business Administration, which has helped finance the annual conferences since 1985, said it may soon sever its ties with the event in part because of the payments to Smith and Margene Campbell.

State records show that $96,000 was paid to three Campbell aides, including Smith, between 1984 and 1986 in connection with the annual women’s conference and a separate yearly event for small businesses.

Campbell, a Hacienda Heights Republican, refused to comment Monday when asked on the Senate floor about the payments. Efforts to reach Margene Campbell were unsuccessful Monday. And Smith referred calls to Campbell’s Sacramento office.

Campbell has been holding the women’s conferences since 1984, offering career tips and self-awareness advice to thousands of women. Expenses were covered by attendance fees, grants from the Small Business Administration and corporate sponsorship.

The 1987 conference, held April 21 and 22 at the Anaheim Hilton, had expenses totaling $564,422, according to Internal Revenue Service forms on file with the state Registry of Charitable Trusts. Of that amount, $165,000 went in “consulting fees” to West Coast Seminars, a firm owned by Smith and Margene Campbell.

According to the Orange County clerk’s office, Smith and Campbell formed their partnership on April 17, 1987--four days before the conference.

State records show that Smith and two other Campbell aides, chief of staff Jerome Haleva and secretary Mary Ann Filker, also made money from the conferences in 1984, ’85 and ’86.

Smith was paid $46,500 for the 1986 women’s conference, $10,000 for the 1985 conference, and $5,000 for the 1984 conference. Smith was paid $11,000 for work on small business conferences sponsored by Campbell in 1984 and 1986. Smith is paid $41,544 a year by the state to work for Campbell.

Haleva was paid $15,000 for the 1986 women’s conference. His state salary is $93,840 a year.

Filker was paid $2,000 for the 1985 women’s conference and $1,000 for the 1984 event. Filker, who declined comment Monday, was paid $4,500 for the small business conferences from 1984 through 1986. She is paid $30,360 a year by the state.

No records are yet available from the 1988 conference. There are no records showing payments to Margene Campbell before 1987.

Sandra Michioku, a spokeswoman for the FPPC, said Monday that the watchdog agency is reviewing the conference payments to determine whether all payments to Campbell’s wife and his aides were properly reported on annual statements of economic interests.

Forms filed by Sen. Campbell, Haleva and Smith appear to show that the three have reported their income from the conference on their state-required disclosure forms. Haleva reported his $15,000 payment one year late, contending in a letter attached to the report that the money was left off due to an oversight.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Peter Shack said the Justice Department also is reviewing the matter but cautioned that there is no formal investigation.

‘Potential Conflict’

Steve Muhlhauser, assistant regional administrator for the SBA, said the agency may soon sever its ties with the annual conference for several reasons.

“The more we look into this whole thing, the more we wonder about the relationship and if they were benefiting off the senator’s conferences,” Muhlhauser said. He said he considers the relationship a “potential conflict of interest.”

Muhlhauser said the SBA has provided postage and printing worth an estimated $243,739 to the women’s conferences since 1985, including $62,761 for the 1987 event and $59,300 this year.

Times staff writer Andrea Ford in Orange County contributed to this article.