Group Failed to Report $1,150 in Campaign Aid : Money: Forces battling a slow-growth initiative in Culver City apparently violated the law in not filing a report on donations and spending.

Pro-growth forces that oppose a citizens initiative aimed at limiting commercial development in Culver City failed last week to report $1,150 in campaign contributions and spending to the city clerk, in apparent violation of state campaign laws.

The state Political Reform Act requires any campaign committee that raises or spends at least $1,000 in the final two weeks of a campaign to report that information to election officials within 24 hours.

Culver City Clerk Pauline Dolce said her office had received no reports of such contributions or expenditures on ballot measures by the close of business Thursday. City Hall was not open Friday.

The issue arose after supporters of the citizens initiative, Measure I on next Tuesday’s ballot, questioned how their opponents could have purchased a half-page newspaper advertisement and printed and sent a last-minute campaign mailer to several thousand voters without exceeding the $1,000 threshold.

In response to questions from The Times, Dorothy Harris, a chairwoman of Citizens for Measure II, confirmed that she had spent more than $1,000 for two mailers and the ad in the weekly Culver City News.

“I spent $1,000 as of Tuesday morning,” Harris said.

A veteran city planning commissioner and wife of the former city manager, Harris said the actual spending total was slightly more than $1,150. She said she had collected $993 in contributions--just under the $1,000 threshold--and provided an additional $160 of her own money as “a temporary loan.”

“I wrote a personal check knowing that it would undoubtedly be covered by contributions we would be receiving,” she said. “A number of people in the community here said they would send me a check and I believed them.”

The Political Reform Act requires loans to be reported as contributions. In municipal elections, the law says, the information must be reported to the city clerk.

Harris said, however, that the committee had filed a spending report Thursday with Los Angeles County election officials, but did not disclose the contributions or loans.

She would not discuss the source of the funds received, except to say that none of the money came from developers of Marina Place, the proposed shopping mall that has emerged as the dominant issue in Tuesday’s election.

She said two mailings were sent, one to members of the Culver City Democratic Club and a much larger mailing to signers of the citizens initiative.

The names of those signing Measure I were released by City Clerk Dolce to pro-development forces, a violation of a state law that makes the names confidential.

The larger mailing listed two separate names--”A Committee for Responsible Growth” on the envelope and “Citizens for Measure II” on the letter inside.

Former Councilman Richard Pachtman, a sponsor of Measure I, has asked the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office and the state Fair Political Practices Commission to investigate circumstances surrounding the release of the names and possible violations of campaign laws by opponents of Measure I.

Assistant Dist. Atty. Curt Livesay said a review was under way “to determine whether or not the investigation is warranted.”

Pachtman said he contacted the district attorney and the FPPC because the issue “goes beyond Measure I and Measure II. It’s a matter of the integrity of the whole (city) government.”

But Harris defended her actions. “We have not done anything knowingly that was improper,” she said. “Whatever we did we did quite forthrightly.”