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More campaign finance reports

I’ve already noted Rep. Earl Jones’ recent campaign finance filing in this post (click here). This post contains more from Greensboro-area House members. The caveats for this post: these are reports for incumbents only. I'm going to take a look at challengers as they actually file to run. Also, this is the quick, once-over version reading of their reports, not a deep scrubbing. That said, here's what I found:

  • Rep. Alma Aadms reports raising $25,586.19 this election cycle (PDF of report), $3,155 of which came in checks $50 or smaller. Pretty much all of her other individual contributors donated less than $500. The exception was Mark Craig ($1,000), who is in the beer distribution business.

    Among the bigger donations from Political Action Committees were Progress Energy ($1,000), N.C. Association of Educators ($500), AT&T ($1,000), Anesthesiologists of the Triad ($4,000), N.C. Hospital Association PAC ($3,000) and Piedmont Radiologists ($3,000).

    Adams reported $14,247.90 in expenditures, which seemingly break down into four categories: travel costs, fundraising costs, newspaper/radio/sign costs and donations to other groups.
     

  • Rep. Pricey Harrison reports raising $64,766.53 and having $108,368.75 on hand as of Jan. 1 (report PDF). That is a serious bankroll for a state legislative seat.

    Harrison’s reports are handwritten, making them tough to get through quickly. However, it’s clear that in addition to Greensboro addresses, Harrison is getting support from folks in Raleigh, elsewhere in North Carolina and even outside the state – Washington, D.C. and South Carolina addresses show up on the report. Former News & Record editor Bill Snider shows up ($4,000), as do other known names like Guilford College President Kent Chabotar ($100), former Greensboro Mayor Jim Melvin ($100), Greensboro civic leader Sally Cone ($500), Capitol Broadcasting President Jim Goodman ($3,000) and former UNC President Bill Friday ($100). Harrison reports exactly one contribution from a political action committee, the Democratic Women of Guilford County ($350).

    The $6,376.49 in expenditures she reported seem to break down between fundraising/fundraiser costs and contributions to other political organizations.
     

  • Rep. Maggie Jeffus reports raising $750.89 for the last six months of 2009 and has $9,402.86 cash on hand as of Jan. 1 (report PDF). Her reports are handwritten, but Jeffus’ campaign treasurer gets an A for penmanship, which I guess you'd expect from someone working for a former school teacher.

    Her two Political Action Committee contributions came from Merck ($250) and Bank of America ($500).

    Jeffus reports spending $490 over the last six months of 2009, all to political action committees.
     

  • Rep. Laura Wiley, a Republican who has announced she is not seeking re-election, reports raising no money over the last half of 2009 (report PDF). She has $10,508.50 in the bank and reports spending $750.
     
  • Rep. John Blust, a Republican, reports raising no money over the last half of 2009 and started 2010 with $757.89 (report PDF).
     
  • Rep. Nelson Cole, a Rockingham County Democrat whose district borders Guilford County, reported $5,345.99 in receipts, including from RJ Reynolds ($1,000), the N.C. Medical Society ($1,000) and Bank of America ($1,000) (report HTML). He reports earning a bunch of interest from his account at Home Savings Bank, including a $494.17 draft on Dec. 31.

    Cole’s reported cash on hand is $84,960.59.

    His $8,115.83 in expenditures seemingly break down between cell pone bills, donations to other candidates, donations to charities and miscellaneous costs like flags, stamps and such.
     

  • Rep. Hugh Holliman is a Lexington Democrat whose district borders Guilford County and who currently serves as the House majority leader (report PDF). He reports raising $49,625 during the last half of 2009. You’ll see a lot of “legislative affairs” consultants on his report, like Brad Crone ($1,000), which is more an indication of his station in the House than anything else. The majority leader plays a role in deciding what legislation moves and what doesn’t. Aside from a lot of out-of-district ZIP codes, Holliman’s report has the usually litany of political givers, including AstraZeneca PAC ($1,200), Bank of America ($4,000 for the period, $8,000 for the cycle), Build PAC ($500 for the period, $3,000 for the cycle), McGuire Woods, a law and lobbying firm ($2,500), N.C. Chiropractic Association ($2,000), and the beat goes on …

    His report contains notations that either reflect tally errors or illegal contributions. For example, Holliman reports contributions from Citizens for Higher Education, a UNC booster PAC that gave $4,000 for the period and $15,000 for the cycle. Candidates are typically only allowed to collect $8,000 in contributions for an election cycle from any one source. There are several notations like this on the report. My guess is these are totals that bled over prior reports since candidate don’t willingly attest to committee infractions of various sorts. I have a call in to Holliman to sort this out.

    Update: I just spoke with Holliman. He said that his campaign uses the software issued by the SBOE. He didn't know why some contributors were reported as giving over the limit for the cycle. "We're very careful," Holliman said, not to accept more than is allowed. Like me, he thinks either someone made an entry error or something else happened that caused the software to build on totals from the last campaign cycle rather than click over to the new 2009-10 tallies. He'll call me back when there's a definitive answer.

    Holliman reported $8,813.53 in expenditures, mostly in fundraising costs, travel costs and contributions to other candidates. Holliman reported a $1,000 donation to U.S. Senate Candidate Cal Cunningham.
     

  • Rep. Harold Brubaker, a Randolph County Republican and former House Speaker whose district borders Guilford County, reported $27,223.20 in contributions and spending $34,161.81 in the last half of 2009 (report PDF). Still, he started the year with $88,751.85. The bulk of his donations came from corporate PACs such as Duke Energy ($4,000), McGuire Woods ($500), N.C. Home Builders ($1,000), Piedmont Natural Gas ($1,000), RJ Reynolds ($1,000), etc.

    Brubaker's expenses include contributions to other committees and various charities. Campaign finance reform advocates may take umbrage at his listing thousands of dollars in payments to credit card issuer Capitol One ($21,386.85) for various meeting and travel expenses.

Local state Senate reports are coming in a different post.

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