See Who Gave Money To Mayor Garcia's "Officeholder Account" After His Re-Election...And How He Spent It

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Preface / Amnesia file: In 1994, LB's then-prominent progressive group ("Long Beach Area Citizens Involved"/LBACI) and Councilman Alan Lowenthal (whom they'd help elect) urged enactment of "Proposition M," dubbed the "Long Beach Campaign Reform Act." Placed on the ballot by the City Council and approved by a vote of the people of Long Beach, it included limits on campaign contributions in candidate races acompanied by the following finding (still visible in LB Muni Code section 2.01.120 (E)):
"Officeholders are responding to high campaign costs by raising large amounts of money in off-election years. This fund-raising distracts them from important public matters, encourages contributions which may have a corrupting influence and gives incumbents an overwhelming and patently unfair fund-raising advantage over potential challengers...The integrity of the governmental process, the competitiveness of campaigns and public confidence in local officials are all diminishing..."

In 1995, the City Council (without a vote of the people and over the objections of a number of Prop M supporters) created "officeholder accounts" that let incumbents collect officeholder contributions in relatively small amounts outside of election cycles for mainly Council district items. In 2007, at the urging of Mayor Bob Foster and with the support of City Auditor Laura Doud, the Council raised the allowable officeholder account totals incumbents could collect, describing this as a way to use contributor-provided sums instead of spending taxpayer-budgeted sums for some Council office desired items.

This remained unchanged until mid-2014, when Robert Garcia took office as Mayor along with Council members Lena Gonzalez, Suzie Price, Stacy Mungo, Roberto Uranga and Rex Richardson joining Councilmembers Suja Lowenthal, Patrick O'Donnell, Dee Andrews and Al Austin. In 2015, Daryl Supernaw succeeded O'Donnell; in 2016 Jeannine Pearce succeeded Suja Lowenthal...and on split votes in 2015 and 2017, Council majorities proceeded to undo much of what LB voters sought to do roughly 20+ years earlier. The results are visible below.

(Feb 9, 2019, 11:30 p.m.) -- LBREPORT.com provides "Follow the Money" coverage below listing entities and individuals that gave money in the second half of 2018 to the "officeholder account" of re-elected Mayor Robert Garcia.

As the data below show, Mayor Garcia benefited significantly from changes made to LB laws by Council majorities during his first term of office. In 2015, a Council majority voted 5-3 (Austin, Price, Mungo dissenting, 4th dist. vacant) to triple the amounts LB incumbents can collect annually in contributions to their officeholder accounts. In April 2017, a Council majority voted (5-3, Supernaw, Price, Mungo dissenting) to politically weaponize their officeholder accounts by letting incumbents give sums from their "officeholder account" to help fund campaigns of their favored candidates running for other city, state and federal offices.

The net result allowed citywide incumbents (such as the Mayor) to collect up to $75,000 (up from $25,000 annually) with Councilmembers allowed to collect up to $30,000 annually (up from $10,000.) In the second half of 2018, Mayor Garcia collected $45,799.99 in contributions to his officeholder account (reaching $68,848.99 for the full year.)

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Robert Garcia officeholder account

Date	Contributor	Amount	LBREPORT.com notes
July 2, 2018	Christopher Wacker (CEO, Laserfiche)	$1,000
July 5, 2018	Bradley Decter (CEO Our Best Assets, Inc)	$250
July 6, 2018	Ana Maria McGuan	$250
July 10, 2018	Randall Hernandez (Banker/Executive Union Bank)	$500	Mr. Hernandez is a Mayoral appointee (currently chairs) City Hall's Economic Development Commission]
July 10, 2018	Arthur Levine (Professor CSULB)	$150	Prof. Levine is a Mayoral appointee to LB's Water Comm'n
July 10, 2018	Ross Riddle (Pres/CEO South Coast Shingle)	$500
July 12, 2018	Marcela Chavez	$100
July 12, 2018	Kathleen Irvine	$100
July 12, 2018	Dennis McConkey	$500
July 16, 2018	CA Nurses Ass'n Political Action Committee	$1,000
July 16, 2018	Long Beach Yellow Cab Cooperative	$1,000
July 17, 2018	444 W. Ocean, LLC	$1,000
July 17, 2018	Timothy Aldrete	$500
July 17, 2018	Michael Barber	$500
July 17, 2018	Beekman Beebe	$500
July 17, 2019	Rick Dessai (Owner R Bar)	$1,000
July 17, 2018	Doug Otto (Att'y at Law)	$250
July 17, 2018	Russell Doyle (Financial Advisor, Wells Fargo Advisor	$350
July 17, 2018	Michael Dunfee	$250
July 17, 2018	Matthew Faulkner (Exec. Dir. Community Hospital LB Foundation	$100
July 17, 2018	Mark Hopson (Development Engr L3_Con)	$100
July 17, 2018	Julia Huang (Business Executive, Intertrend)	$1,000
July 17, 2018	Samuel A, Keesal, Jr. (Att'y, Keesal, Young & Logan	$1,000
July 17, 2018	Donald Keith Kennedy (Pres. Beaumark Group, Inc.)	$100
July 17, 2018	Fahranaz Khaleghi (Exec. Dir. Community Improvement League)	$250
July 17, 2018	Janet K. Lee (Real Eatate Broker, SPOA So Cal)	$100
July 17, 2018	Long Beach Area Chamber of Commerce PAC	$500
July 17, 2018	LB Police Officers Political Action Committee	$1,000
July 17, 2018	Darla McAllister (Appraiser, SPOA So Cal)	$100
July 17, 2018	Marsha Naifi	$1,000
July 17, 2018	Feliciano Orozco (Owner, Aluminum Precision Products)	$500
July 17, 2018	Carmen O. Perez	$100
July 17, 2018	Jeffrey O. Prang (L.A. County Assessor	$250
July 17, 2018	Sean Rawson (Developer, Waterford Group	$1,000
July 17, 2018	Sofia Riley (Business Development, TGIS Catering Services)	$500
July 17, 2018	Tony Shooshani (Real Estate Agent, Shooshani Developers, LLC	$250
July 17, 2018	SMG	$1,000
Aug. 8, 2018	Center Cal Properties (El Segundo)	$1,000
Aug. 8, 2018<.td>	Environmental Construction Group	$500
Aug. 8, 2018	Universal Technical Institute (Scottsdale, AZ)	$500
Aug. 8, 2018	Tgrene Energy Fund (Petaluma, CA)	$500
Aug. 13, 2018	CA Teamsters Public Affairs Council	$1,000
Aug. 15, 2018	Tesoro Companies	$1,000
Aug. 27, 2018	UA Journeymen & Apprentices Local PAC 250	$1,000
Sep. 27, 2018	L.A./OC Building & Construction Trades Council PAC	$500
Oct. 1, 2018	Foss Maritime Co. (Seattle, WA)	$500
Oct. 29, 2019	Committee to Expand the Middle Class, Supported by Airbnb	$1,000
Nov. 29, 2018	Ana Maria McGuan (second $250 contrib)	$250
Dec. 10, 2018	Phyllis Venable (Consultant, Silhouette Consulting Group	$100
Dec. 14, 2018	Randall Hernandez (Banker/Executive Union Bank) (in addition to $500 July 10)	$250	Mr. Hernandez is a Mayoral appointee (currently chairs) City Hall's Economic Development Commission]
Dec. 14, 2018	Gerald R. Miller	$250	Retired LB City Mgr.
Dec. 14, 2018	Elissa Briggs Thomas (Transportation, CSULB	$1,000
Dec. 17, 2018	Gloria Cordero (Business Owner, Cordero & Associates	$250	Ms. Cordero is a Mayoral appointee to LB's Water Comm'n
Dec. 17, 2018	Mark Hopson (Development Engr L3_Con)(in add'n to $100 July 17)	$200
Dec. 17, 2018	Feliciano Olague	$500	Business Owner, Precision Products, Inc.
Dec. 17, 2018	Rockefeller Kempel Architects (San Pedro)	$500
Dec. 17, 2018	Dan Salas (CEO, Harbor Breeze Cruises)	$1,000
Dec. 17, 2018	Targeted Technologies, LLC	$250
Dec. 20, 2018	Bradley Decter (CEO Our Best Assets, Inc)	$100
Dec. 20, 2018	Sayles Management Co., LLC (Culver City)	$500
Dec. 20, 2018	The Lamar Companies (Los Angeles)	$1,000
Dec. 28, 2018	Coca Cola North America	$800
Dec. 31, 2018	Beta 3 Group	$1,000
Dec. 31, 2018	CA Apt. Ass'n PAC	$500
Dec. 31, 2018	dba Shoreline Village Enterprises ABA Enterprises, LLC	$1,000
Dec. 31, 2018	Bradley Decter (CEO Our Best Assets, Inc)	$500
Dec. 31, 2018	Grand Prix Ass'n of Long Beach, LLC	$500
Dec. 31, 2018	Maricela Guillermo	$250
Dec. 31, 2018	Int'l Union of Operating Engineers Local 12 (Pasadena, CA)	$1,000
Dec. 31, 2018	Kambiz Babaoff	$500
Dec. 31, 2018	Gary Kirkpatrick (Sherman Oaks)	$500
Dec. 31, 2018	Southwest Regional Council of Carpenters PAC (Los Angeles)	$800

Sponsor

In the second half of 2018, Mayor Garcia used his officeholder account to give $5,500 to the Los Angeles County Democratic Party (plus $400 for a print ad); $1,000 to the Long Beach Democratic Club; $1,000 to campaign to elect Betty Yee State Controller; and $1,000 to the campaign to elect Fiona Ma State Treasurer.

Garcia also used his officeholder account to give sums it listed as civic donations to the Rotary Club of LB ($750), United Cambodian Community ($500), Cambodia Town Film Festival ($1,000), CSULB Associated Students ($500). Centro Cha ($1,000) and Khmer Parent Association ($1,000)

Garcia's officeholder account ended 2018 with a cash balance of $8,635.88 and outstanding debts (unpaid bills) of $3,241.33.

Sponsor

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