IRVINE : Campaign Financing Rules OKd

After hours of tortuous, page-by-page debate over proposed revisions to the city’s campaign finance rules, the City Council approved a new ordinance early Wednesday.

The new campaign regulations raise limits on personal contributions from $190 to $300. The ordinance also imposes limits on contributions by political action committees for the first time in the city’s history.

Key provisions of the new ordinance must be approved by voters, but the next chance for a city election will not come until March, 1996.

Representatives from the League of Women Voters, Common Cause and Tin Cup organizations told council members they would support the new ordinance only if it contained restrictions on expenditures by political action committees. The restrictions had been deleted from the proposed ordinance after concerns were raised about a lawsuit filed against Huntington Beach over similar restrictions.

Councilman Barry J. Hammond cast the only vote against the political action committee contribution limit, saying it will allow elections to be “controlled by labor unions.”

Council members rejected a recommendation to raise the current $190 limit on individual contributions to $500, settling instead for a $300 limit.

Contribution limits in the new ordinance, if approved by voters, will apply to the full term of office, which is two years for mayor and four years for council members. The old limit applied to the calendar year.

Residents will not vote on the entire ordinance, but only provisions relating to the increase in contribution limits.