Springs and Dubey File Corrected Finance Reports

Stephen Springs and Bob Dubey filed corrected 30-day campaign finance reports. Spoiler alert: Stephen Springs's update eliminated my question about his. Bob Dubey's correction...didn't.

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On April 13, The Wheel examined the 30-Day Campaign Finance Reports for candidates for Richardson City Council. For the most part, those reports were unremarkable. I did have a couple of technical legal questions regarding contributions by LLCs but those have been (mostly) cleared up.

Since my initial analysis, Stephen Springs has filed a Correction/Amendment Affidavit that changes an LLC contribution to a personal contribution. That eliminates my question about that.

In Dubey's original report, his numbers for contributions didn't add up. And he was missing Schedule F1 (Political Expenditures). Dubey also filed a Correction/Amendment Affidavit. Unfortunately, Dubey's correction does not clear up all the problems. His numbers still don't add up. It looks to me like yet another correction is called for.

Stephen Springs's affidavit explains his correction as follows: "Correct Schedule A2 pages 1 & 2; in-kind contributors Brown and Batt were incorrectly identified by business." That eliminates one question I had about the legality of LLCs making political donations to candidates. Since I raised the question in my first report, I've learned that LLCs are not prohibited from making contributions to candidates. Corporations are prohibited, but an LLC (Limited Liability Company) is not a corporation. Unless the LLC has some corporate ownership, LLC contributions are legal. In any case, Springs's correction makes even that question moot. He no longer lists any LLCs in his list of contributors. I appreciate his desire not just to follow the letter of the law, but to do so in a way that leaves no doubts in voters' minds. Dubey didn't make such a correction to his report, but because Dubey's contribution was from Jasmine Cafe LLC, I will presume there is no corporate ownership behind that LLC, and so this contribution is legal and no correction for at least that detail is necessary.

Bob Dubey's affidavit explains the corrections he did make as follows:

1. Faild [sic] to attach Form F1
2. Left a Name off of the Donation on Form A-1
3. Faild [sic] to attach Form A-2

Form F1 is the form listing expenditures. Dubey's affidavit shows itemized expenditures totaling $13,859.47, which matches the total shown in the cover sheet (hooray). There's nothing questionable in any of the expenditures. His biggest expenditures were $5,475 on newspaper and magazine ads, $4,918.68 on signs, and $1,061.82 on T-shirts.

The Dubey affidavit also shows two expenditures of $147.20 each for "post cards." It doesn't say what post cards those were, but if either of these (or even both of these together) are for that Mark Solomon post card that Richardson residents received, that would clear up a question I raised about the legality of the post card not including a standard disclosure statement. According to Texas law, if the cost of the mailer is less than $500.00, no disclosure statement on the card is required. Still, given that "Transparent" is one of the pillars of the Dubey campaign, I would think that he would want to transparently disclose who is paying for his campaign mailers, even if the law technically doesn't require him to.

Form A2 is for Non-monetary (in-kind) contributions. Dubey's correction shows one: $317.50 for "Car magnets" and "Shirts". I guess this, when added to the direct expenditures on T-shirts, explains why you see so many of these walking advertisements for Dubey around town.

Form A1: Dubey's affidavit claims that he "Left a Name off of the Donation on Form A-1" but his affidavit still fails to include the name. The mismatch between his calculated total and the actual total of his itemizations is in the thousands of dollars, so it would appear to be a pretty hefty contribution left off. Another correction affidavit is called for. Like I said in my first analysis: "At the very least, it creates doubt about Dubey's attention to detail, a critical trait you'd want in a mayor, whose most important responsibilities include passing a City budget. If he can't produce a complete and accurate campaign finance report [now in two tries], how can he be expected to oversee a much more complicated City budget?"