RECIPE FOR SUCCESS:

There’s been much fuss surrounding the Newport Beach City Council races regarding Independent expenditure committees. The average voter probably has never encountered the term, but has received many of these mailers every campaign season.

Simply put, “Indep- endent expen- ditures pay for communications (like mailers, ads) that expressly advocate the nomination, election or defeat of a clearly identified candidate, but which is not made to, or at the behest of, a candidate. These expenditures must be made completely ‘independent’ of the candidate; no coordination can take place between the candidates or their campaigns and the entity that makes the independent expenditure,” according to the California Fair Political Practices Commission.

Independent expenditures are easy to create and have no funding limits. Remember, campaign financing laws are created by politicians for politicians. Laws that probably wouldn’t exist if there weren’t campaign contribution limitations. All perfectly legal and to political insiders and campaign consultants, they can be the turning point in determining the outcome of a race.

Independent expenditures are easy to track and quite transparent. Identify the committee’s name on the mailer you receive. Go to www.sos.ca.gov; click “campaign finance” then the section “committees, parties, major donors & Slate Mailers”. Find the committee’s name and all the information’s there.

If the independent expenditure is working for you, no problem; but if they’ve been created to defeat your campaign, that’s when candidates start crying foul and questioning the ethics of the independent expenditure laws.

But like it or not, that’s the political game. Whining is not a recipe for success here and, if you let your anger show, it only reveals your fear.

Politics is a double-edged sword. You can’t have it both ways.

Some question the police, fire and lifeguard associations of Newport Beach and those in Costa Mesa who openly campaign and donate money to incumbents. These associations use their Political Action Committee (PAC) dollars to fund mailers on candidates’ behalf and in some cases actually walk precincts for the candidates they’ve endorsed.

Let’s not forget, these incumbents have already voted on these associations benefit packages, and will be asked to do so again if reelected.

Costa Mesa council candidates Gary Monahan, Jim Righeimer and Eric Bever chose not to attend their cities’ association endorsement meetings, questioning the ethics of such practices.

Righeimer who has law enforcement relatives in his family said, “I have no issues with the associations and I told them so ... I am a strong law and order candidate but we need to take a look at these benefit packages throughout the state ... the pre-endorsement questionnaire sent out by the Police Department leaned heavily on benefits and working conditions and not about catching criminals.

“If I received a $250 campaign contribution, I couldn’t vote on that person’s room extension, but I can benefit from police and fire associations PAC money and mailers and then vote on their contracts worth millions of dollars to the city” says Monahan, who’s also been a strong supporter of fire and police. “It’s not about public safety; this is an issue of ethics.”

Could these PACs spend upwards of $100,000 in the Costa Mesa race this year alone? That’s what some are predicting.

BARBARA VENEZIA is the chairman of the Santa Ana Hts. Redevelopment Project Advisor Committee and was the co-creator of the cooking show “At Home on the Range” with John Crean.