front page - search - community

EDITORIAL
Change this law
(Published January 12, 2004)

D.C. voters should find it somewhat curious that Mayor Anthony A. Williams – just one year into his second four-year term – recently said that the next three years won’t be enough time for him to, according to The Washington Post, "reform the school system, put more police officers on the beat and improve customer service in government agencies."

That would be after eight years of working on those initiatives.

The mayor’s comments came with the disclosure that he has reconsidered his 2002 damnation of third mayoral terms and may form an exploratory committee to possibly run again.

On the surface, the mayor’s comments might be just a blip on the political radar screen. But the mayor’s timing, with a recall effort gathering steam in Northwest Washington, along with his documented history of ethical missteps, raise some serious questions about how such an exploratory committee would operate.

Think about it: Why does a sitting mayor, who already has won two landslide election victories, need an exploratory committee to determine his viability as a candidate for mayor?

The short answer: He doesn’t.

The longer answer involves a legal loophole that makes a complete mockery of the District’s campaign finance laws and its financial disclosure requirements for senior government officeholders.

An "exploratory committee," according to D.C. regulations, never needs to tell the public anything about its activities unless it is later transformed into the designated beneficiary’s official campaign committee. And there is no requirement for that to happen. A candidate could simply start a new official committee to run his or her election campaign.

That means the mayor’s exploratory committee could – just as any other incumbent’s or non-incumbent’s exploratory committee could – solicit unrestricted financial contributions and dole out money, including cold cash, without disclosing who gave the money, how much they contributed and who got it or why.

It’s all perfectly legal in the District, because the people who make the laws are among the biggest potential beneficiaries of the loophole.

The possibilities for public servants to abuse these "slush funds" – for example, to improperly influence election outcomes or to pressure government contractors – should jolt any D.C. resident who believes in maintaining honesty, integrity and accountability in the D.C. government.

In the case of Mayor Williams, former inspector general Charles Maddox documented the mayor’s personal involvement in soliciting a contribution from a city contractor for one of his administration’s nonprofit organizations as part of the fundraising scandal during Williams’ first term.

Still unresolved and under investigation by the D.C. Office of Campaign Finance and the U.S. attorney is the question of where the mayor’s 2002 re-election campaign came upon the wads of cash it used to pay circulators of the mayor’s forged petitions.

Both of these examples speak poorly of the mayor’s ethical barometer.

There is no question that the District’s campaign finance disclosure laws need to be strengthened to ensure that the general public, rather than special interests or self-interest, is being served by the D.C. government.