Is this the end of fair elections in Chapel Hill?
Let’s be clear – this is NOT business as usual
Big money politics has come to Chapel Hill. A small but affluent group of Chapel Hill residents is planning to flood our local mayor and town council election with upward of $120,000 to influence its outcome. Why? Because a recent Council vote did not go their way.They plan to funnel funds in support of their hand-picked slate of candidates — Adam Searing, David Adams, Elizabeth Sharp, Renuka Soll, and Breckany Eckhardt. This influx of funds will serve to subvert our local democracy and is a cynical effort to disenfranchise the electorate. How did we get here?
Nationwide, since the 2010 Citizens United Supreme Court case, the influence of money in politics has been an ever increasing concern. At the federal and state levels we have seen how big donors have outsized influence over policy agendas. For instance, here in North Carolina, the GOP routinely ignores majority support for gun safety legislation, reproductive rights, LGBTQ rights, and investment in public schools. They do this because their wealthy, extreme right-wing donors are paying the bills. We should all be concerned about the influence of money in politics at every level of government.
In North Carolina, the campaign contribution limit per candidate or political action committee is $6,400. This means in most races in NC, you can donate to your favorite candidates up to that limit. I think you will agree, for a local race — such as mayor, town council, or school board - that amount is unnecessarily high, and also well outside most people’s financial ability to contribute.
Many years ago, the Town of Chapel Hill had the foresight to try to limit the influence of money in our local politics by setting allowable political donation limits, developed as a reflection of our community’s values. That is why, despite the state-level cap of $6,400, the local cap for individual contributions to mayor and council elections is $357. The 2009 ordinance that created the Vote-Owned Elections program stated, “It is in the public interest that the detrimental effects of increasingly large amounts of money being raised and spent in Chapel Hill to influence the outcome of municipal elections be minimized and that the meaningful participation of all citizens in the democratic process be enhanced.” Recently, winning mayoral and council candidates have raised between $5,000 and $20,000 – a good deal of money, to be sure, but divided among many donors. With this small limit, no one group can have outsized influence.
This is where political action committees or PACs come in. The purpose of a PAC is to raise and spend money to elect and defeat specific candidates. They are a way to circumvent election spending limits, like the ones we have here. While they are legal, they raise valid concerns around the influence of money on election outcomes and disenfranchisement of the electorate. Do we really want to go down this path here in Chapel Hill?
You may be surprised to learn we are already well along our way. Going back to 2015, CHALT formed a PAC called Chapel Hill Leadership Political Action Committee to circumvent town campaign giving limits. Despite their claims that it is grassroots, CHALT founders Julie McClintock, and her husband, John Morris, have contributed thousands of dollars — over ten times the sum that can be donated to an individual candidate.
Now that brings us to this election. As reported by the N&O, a few wealthy residents plan to contribute $120,000 to the CHALT PAC because they are unhappy with a recent policy decision — known as Housing Choices for A Complete Community — by the current Mayor and Town Council to allow duplexes in residential areas with numerous restrictions. This elite and privileged group wants to funnel funds in support of their chosen slate of candidates. Let me say that again - $120,000 for their hand-picked slate. That’s a lot more than the $5,000 to $20,000 raised by most council candidates during an election.
Put differently, each of the donors to the PAC plan to contribute 18 times the individual candidate limit.
To be clear, these 19 wealthy residents believe their opinion of the Town’s direction should trump everyone else’s. The original plan – as reported by Triangle Blog Blog – was to start a new PAC but when that came out in the media, they shifted to contributing those funds to the CHALT PAC.
CHALT has long made baseless — but damaging — claims about opposing candidates being unduly influenced by developers. If donations do purchase influence with elected officials, then CHALT and its new wealthy donors have situated themselves well to dictate the future direction of town policy.
I think our residents are smarter than that. If these wealthy donors truly have the majority of voters on their side, as they claim, why the need to put a very heavy thumb on the scale? Let’s have fair and transparent elections and truly let the voters decide what direction Chapel Hill should take.
Karen --
As you know, I am the Treasurer of the Chapel Hill Leadership PAC. We were organized in 2015, not to "circumvent town campaign giving limits" as you suggest, but to follow the intent of the NC Election Laws. Any organization or group of people which raises and spends money to support candidates for elective office or to take a public position on any referenda contained in an election is expected to form a Political Action Committee (PAC) and to be registered with the NC State Board of Elections (SBE). This PAC is required to appoint a treasurer, who must complete a training course administered by the SBE. The Treasurer is then required to prepare and submit periodic Campaign Finance Reports to the SBE and to county Boards of Elections. These reports contain the donation amounts and names and information about the donors to the PAC, as well as the amounts and information about all expenditures by the PAC. CHL-PAC will except donations from anyone who desires to support our chosen candidates.
The CHL-PAC has, through the years, raised and disbursed funds to support GOTV efforts in support of candidates for Chapel Hill Mayor and Council, including your candidacy. These include distributing printed materials through canvassing and mailings. We have not given any donations directly to Candidate Committees, but if we were to do so, we would be limited to the current maximum of $357 per candidate. You seem suggest that the activities of a PAC will affect the "fairness" of an election. Certainly, you don't believe that our support of your candidacy was unfair, because you did not at any time deny our support for you.
I agree with you that we should always have transparent elections, wherein all donations and expenditures are public records. Rather than attack CHL-PAC, I suggest that you should call out NEXT and Triangle Blog Blog for not revealing their election funding (i.e. dark money), for their actions and attacks on homeowners truly undercut fair elections.
Regards,
Tom Henkel
Reposting here since I'm not seeing it when I looked back at this page:
Tom Henkel (re: his comment), you might be interested to note that your response in NO WAY contradicts what Karen wrote about the CHALT PAC being formed to circumvent local election laws. You wrote: "We were organized in 2015, not to 'circumvent town campaign giving limits' as you suggest, but to follow the intent of the NC Election Laws." But NOT the LOCAL election laws.
You (conveniently and self-servingly) ignore the obvious fact, which Karen mentioned, that the Chapel Hill election laws were made to be stronger (and more locally reasonable) than the NC election laws. Maybe you didn't read Karen's whole previous blog. Your group of wealthy donors prefer the State limits since you can easily buy elections, given the more-limiting local limits. Your subversion of this fact, as far as I can tell from the outside over all these years, is typical of your group over the years; it's at least what I expect in ANY communication/mailing, etc. from your group.
You also wrote: "You seem suggest that the activities of a PAC will affect the 'fairness' of an election. Certainly, you don't believe that our support of your candidacy was unfair, because you did not at any time deny our support for you." Karen obviously does believe that, as I certainly do! Even if she and several of the current board did take your money back then, it doesn't in any way diminish the truth of the statement. PAC's of all kinds and flavors have that inevitable outcome; if you don't see it, it's only because you actually rely on it and have made a decision not to see it.
It seems fairly obvious to anyone paying attention that with the amount of money CHALT is pouring into the election, as well as the huge amount of money that Adam Searing has received for his attempted election, that you are simply confirming her assertions. Since I received mail from your group daily for the past 3 weeks or so, I'll say you are trying to buy the election! And you are happy that you might just succeed.