responsibility was. i certainly don't think that it was deliberate and it was negligent and it was isolated and there is no existing history with our commission of a violation at all, however she did not cooperate at all, either the campaign finance staff or myself. >> can you describe for us, what communications you had with her, if any. >> i personally have never spoken to her, i sent her various letters starting in november, 2013, and she had a probable cause report in march and we held a hearing which she did respond to but did not attend, and sent out in june and noticed of this meeting in september, i tried to reach her by telephone a couple of times, she either had a message that said that her voice mail box is full so i couldn't leave a

message, or if i could leave a message she did not return my call, the address has been consistent and the it is the same as all of the filings and i believe that it is her home and so everybody was sent there and she never responded prior to the start of this action, to the campaign finance staff who reached out to her, both, via e-mail and telephone and letter to try to get her to file which is what we always do. >> anything? >> public comment? >> >> no public comment? >> any other questions, is there a motion from the commission? >> all right, i just wanted to note that so this january, 31, 2011, it was reported that she had an ending cash balance of

2300 and outstanding debts of 8,000 dollars and i will bring that to our attention as we go forward in a... some kind of a decision on this violation. >> you know, i think, you know for me, there are always competing concerns when we have complaints like this. you know, on the one hand, i do think that we need to enforce these regulations because otherwise, people are not going to follow them and we need to have some deterrent effect. on the other hand, i want to make sure that people who are running for office, who don't have big campaigns and don't have professionals helping them are not completely discouraged by failing to file forms, that probably would have resolved matters for them relatively quickly. i think for me, the reason why i am comfortable with this recommendation is because of the great efforts we have made

to try to get the respondent to resolve and i think the public, it is recognized that we are willing to cooperate with the respondents particularly in this kind of a situation, who acknowledge that they did not file forms, and get it fixed and you know, this probably could have been resolved, for, much less than what is being proposed here, if the respondent had merely responded to the phone calls. so, and i do think that it is a serious issue to not file your forms. because there could be a situation where they could really be deceiving the public by not filing them. it may not be the case here, but i think to me, that makes the amount although, high, reasonable. and but, i welcome, these from other commissioners. >> and commissioner hayon >> my question is i just need to be reminded of what will happen. and once we decide on this penalty. and she is not going to respond to the penalty, she is not

going to pay it, i would assume. i don't know that. but, given the lack of response thus far, what do we do then? do we garish wages? what do we do? >> it will go to the bureau of revenue and they will, well we will try to collect it first and we have a judgment from you saying here is what we need to pay, and reach out to try to collect that. and they, require a certain amount of effort from us to do that and then it could be sent to them for them to collect, basically they are like a collection agency for the city. and i am not, 100 percent on the process, but that is what happens. >> and do we ever make an attempt to actually go to the individual's home and knock on their door, and see if they are there. >> well, these are done by the process server and so i personally have not done that, and i suppose that it is not beyond the relevant tom realm to do that.

>> we don't normally do that? >> no. >> right. >> and having the delinquent revenues would sue in small claims court and get a judgment, if they have the requisite amount of information they will try to garnish the wages but that is the process. >> and i have another question, thank you. chairman. i would, and in it, and i was going to hold on to it, until we got to the executive director report, but, now, that we are talking about it, i think that it is appropriate. so, once we make a determination, on the amount of the violation, that in some way, we have created this contractual agreement that you owe us money, that is now debt, how do we treat that on our balance sheet? do we carry that as a debt and is that a liability? i mean, we typically and

certainly, in business, on the accounts receivable, you do that, and on the particular judgments you can carry it and at some point the auditor is going to tell you that you need to write that off because it is going against your assets. >> we are not a revenue producing department, there are few that are, the larger ones and so while we do, the city does track the revenues that we collect as deposits into the general fund. there is no deficits recorded, when we have outstanding debts like this. and then, we have 90 days to collect them and then, the city law requires that we refer them to bdr and then it sort of becomes, their responsibility. >> okay. >> so, commissioner hayon. >> more of a general comment that these two cases make me think of, is that it is a shame, and you know, i do have some sympathy for the

individuals involved, and usually it is individuals, who are first time candidates, maybe not completely familiar with the regulations which they are supposed to adhere to. and so, and i just wonder, how we can possibly avoid this, these kinds of situations, and i'm... and i am understanding that there will always be situations of this nature. but, something about the way that we train candidates, if we can do, is there something different that we can do, in the training, or in the way that we inform people who are running for office or running campaigns who may be fairly naive or new to the process. and i don't know if that is a question for you, or for you, mr. st. croix. >> there is often, an

understandable feeling on behalf of candidates, that run and are not elected that they go through all of the rig ors of the candidate and all of the difficulties of understanding the myriad of laws and, we finally frequently just don't want it deal with that process, any more. they would like to just sort of shut it down and walk away from it and unfortunately, they can't do that, there is obligations that they encure to themself and there is a certain frustration level because people don't really how complicated it can be to run for office when they initiate these effort and so unfortunately, you know, in situations like these, really, are too bad, because if we could have worked with this person, and maybe, there would be one count here in stead of six and possibly none, if they had paid off their debt and

cleared out their bank, before that first filing deadline that they missed, you know, we take it retroactively terminate and that would have been the end of it but those obligations do exist and we are pretty clear in the training that the election day is not the end of the campaign. and for example, the public finance, candidates they have even more obligations and so we have to be sure that these folks know what they are, and but it is that syndrome that i just described that contributes a lot to this. >> understandable. >> and the other thing that i would say and what is the number, and it is 9,000 that the staff is recommended and the 9,000 penalty, is that right. >> yes. and if you will allow me to try to add a rationale to a number. and in our last ruling there

was 10,000 and we got to 2,000 and we somehow talked ourselves through that that we got there. and we have 9,000 here and i am thinking someone who did not follow a regulations, and in the fliers that you put out, if you are asking about harm, how many people were harmed, meaning that they could not read that form that they otherwise, could be able to read and be more informed, and from that harm, we made this determination? and for this particular one, there were 6 counts, and i understand, but then i think about how many people were harmed along the way and who is to define harm and how far-reaching that goes, but this is this one individual's failure to file, over and over and over again. and, to in the absence of any other rationale, that we could

apply to a fee, at least i see that there was a balance of $2300, at that time. in which case, i am not sure how we came to 1500 dollars per and maybe you want to say a word about that. >> so i looked at past settlements again where the people cooperated with us on these kinds of violation and it was in that $500 range and because of the effort of going through and going through the process, we thought that three times that was appropriate. and however, i said at the beginning for you to consider that in the majority, and the vast majority of the cases like this, when someone is cooperating with us, they could have terminated at the first filing that they didn't file. the issue of we don't know how she resolved this debt and we don't know if she raised more money from people to do it, we don't know if she took on loans to do it, it is unclear, i agree that the public harm is

probably very minimal. and this respondent and her campaign and she was unsuccessful and did not run again. you know, there is a fine structure in place for these, however, you cannot assess the fine until the filings is filed, and so there is a cap, but the limit would be the amount of activity on the late filing, so let's say that it was a year late, right? and she raised $6,000 but she needed to pass that debt, you could do $6,000. and if there is no activity, there is a different cap, it is much lower. and so you could look at it that way, but because these are never filed, we don't know, that answer. but, that is where i came up with that number and just looking at the effort that was put into this, opposed to people who are cooperative, and because this happens. and the people, and generally the people who once we contact them will work with us to resolve it. >> i guess from all of that, then, i was just thinking,

about that, and these counts, these six counts, at $500 is close to what your ending balance was in 2011. >> although, i am not sure that the ending balance necessarily has a correlation. >> it has no correlation, and i said in the absence of any other rationale and there is rationale and it is consistent on what has, and it was asked in the amount of cooperation, and other mitigating factors that were there and aggravating issues as well and i understand that you have applied that to it. >> is there a motion to accept the staff's recommendation to find a violation in the amount of 1500 per count? >> i move it. >> second.

>> all in favor. >> public comment? >> we did public comment, but... >> you are right, i am sorry. >> we did have a lot of discussion after the first public comment, is there anybody that wants to give public comment on this item? >> all in favor? >> aye. >> opposed? >> no. >> that passes 4-1. >> the next item on the agenda... >> we don't need the stenographer any more. >> thank you. >> the next item on the agenda is possible discussion and action relating to a complaint received or initiated by the ethics commission. is there a vote, is there a motion to go into closed session to discuss possible litigation as plaintiff. >> so moved. >> second. >> public comment?

>> hearing none, all in favor? >> aye. >> opposed? >> hearing none, that motion passes we will go into closed session. [closed session] >>