Campaign Fixer-Upper

Campaign finance reform is like owning a money-pit house: Repairs are an ongoing process. The challenge is to keep at it, figuring out what’s working and fixing what’s not.

That’s exactly what the Los Angeles City Council did in May when it approved an emergency ordinance to fix a loophole created by last year’s statewide Proposition 34.

Proposition 34 allows political parties, unions, businesses and other groups to “communicate” with their members about candidates or issues without having to disclose until after the election how much they spent or who contributed to the effort. Los Angeles’ emergency ordinance ferreted out more than $800,000 in spending on glossy mailers that would have otherwise gone unreported.

Without such disclosure, the complex balance of incentives to achieve voluntary spending limit by candidates unravels, threatening the reforms that Los Angeles voters put in place in 1990.

Yet two weeks ago the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission said that Los Angeles’ ordinance was preempted by the same misleading state law it sought to improve. The commission is willing to toughen statewide laws and suggests that the Legislature should do so by passing Senate Bill 34, sponsored by Senate leader John Burton (D-San Francisco).

Reform backers are hopeful that the bill can be amended to address the concerns raised by the Los Angeles election. But they will need to dog the bill through committee hearings on up to the governor’s desk. If the bill fails or if it fails to fix the problems, then the Los Angeles City Council should pass a new ordinance--the emergency one covered only the June 5 election--and settle the matter in court.