Legislators kill bill on campaign financing

By Lynda Arakawa
Advertiser Capitol Bureau

A bill promoting publicly financed campaigns was killed yesterday when three Senate committees failed to vote on it by a legislative internal deadline.

The proposed legislation, which needed to be passed out of various committees to Ways and Means by last night's deadline, would have created a voluntary public-financed elections pilot program for the 2002 Honolulu City Council elections.

Participating candidates each would have received $40,000 in public money for the primary election and $40,000 for the general election. Candidates would have had to collect $2 contributions from 250 voters in their district to qualify for the program and would have had to abide by contribution restrictions.

Supporters of the bill, including good-government citizen groups, told the committees such legislation is a good step in fixing campaign finance problems. They said it would encourage more people to run for office and that it would help to eliminate the public perception that politicians are in the pockets of special interest groups who give large contributions.

State Campaign Spending Commission executive director Bob Watada, however, said he did not support the bill because the law already provides for partially public-financed campaigns and that it could be expanded without passing additional legislation.

He also has said he doesn't think many people would participate in the program because it is difficult to raise qualifying contributions and that the cost of City Council races runs at least $100,000.