State Ban on Fund Raising by Aides of Officials Urged : Ethics: Reformers call for new rules after disclosure of activities by Bradley commissioners, staff.

A statewide ban should be imposed on campaign fund raising by aides to elected officials, ethics reform experts said Monday after reports by The Times of possible conflicts of interest by Mayor Tom Bradley’s appointees and City Hall staff.

“Nobody in government should be raising campaign money for the people they work for. . . . That should be a state law,” said Bob Stern, co-director and general counsel of the nonprofit California Commission on Campaign Financing.

Geoff Cowan, who helped draft Los Angeles’ sweeping ethics reforms approved by voters in June, said that public employees should be prohibited from raising campaign funds from anyone who has official contact with the employees or their bosses.

When the new city Ethics Commission convenes in January, Cowan said, the panel “should quickly adopt rules and regulations to cover” questionable fund-raising activities disclosed by The Times. Members of the Ethics Commission could not be reached for comment.

The Times reported on Sunday and Monday that in the past five years commissioners and mayoral aides have helped raise more than $700,000 for Bradley’s campaigns, often from contractors, lobbyists and others they dealt with on official matters.

In a possible violation of state law, several commissioners held fund-raisers in their homes that yielded thousands of dollars in contributions from contractors and others who had matters pending before their commissions, according to records and interviews. Also, Bradley’s staff operated a political fund-raising network inside City Hall and apparently used city staff, offices and equipment.

Commissioners denied that they violated any laws, but said that they were not adequately alerted to potential conflicts by the city attorney, Bradley’s aides or campaign officials.

Bradley, who was in New York on Monday, has refused to be interviewed about the fund-raising activities. But the mayor said in a statement that he always emphasized the need to separate city and campaign business.

“All of the allegations raised by The Times’ stories are under review at the mayor’s direction,” Deputy Mayor Mark Fabiani said Monday. “If you got this kind of access to other (candidates’) campaign records, there undoubtedly would be questions raised.”

The fund-raising activities were revealed in internal Bradley campaign records obtained by court order. The records covered Bradley’s 1986 campaign for governor, his 1985 campaign for mayor and part of his 1989 mayoral campaign.

“It would be a mistake to assume that the events discussed in The Times are relevant to the mayor’s office today,” Fabiani said, noting that most of the disclosures involve the 1985 and 1986 campaigns. Bradley lawyers have refused to provide 1989 campaign records, most of which were not available under the court order.

“Tom Bradley has always said he detests political fund raising,” Fabiani said. “(He) led the successful fight for public financing of all city elections.”

Stern and Cowan noted the new ethics law already has addressed some of the problems outlined by The Times. The new Ethics Commission has been given subpoena power to investigate internal campaign records when necessary, and a special prosecutor can be appointed by a panel of judges to investigate potential conflicts of interest involving elected officials and public employees.

The new city law prohibits hand delivery of campaign contributions in city offices and expands on state restrictions on fund raising by commissioners, Cowan said. State law prohibits local appointees from soliciting contributions from anyone who has a matter pending before their agencies. That ban extends three months after a final decision is rendered.

The new city law prohibits commissioners from seeking donations from anyone who had a matter before their agencies during the previous 12 months. Cowan said the Ethics Commission should consider extending the ban to 12 months after a decision. Stern, Cowan and at least two City Council members said activities in the mayor’s office show that additional restrictions on fund raising by aides of elected officials are needed.

“They don’t have to do that,” said Stern, whose commission studies and makes recommendations for political reforms. “(Fund raising) is not really part of being a staffer and it shouldn’t be part of the job.”

Said Councilman Marvin Braude, “I would consider (fund raising by aides) improper” even under current law. “Their role is to serve the public, quite apart from contributors,” he said.

Braude also said reforms are needed to require full disclosure whenever commissioners, city aides, lobbyists and anyone else is involved in soliciting and relaying donations for the campaigns of public officials.

Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky said he, too, would support legislation to restrict fund raising by aides. “That’s not their job, and that’s not the job of commissioners,” he said.