Political Reform Act of 1974: campaign disclosures.

The Political Reform Act of 1974 generally requires elected officials, candidates for elective office, and committees formed primarily to support or oppose a candidate for public office or a ballot measure, along with other entities, to file periodic campaign statements and certain reports concerning campaign finances and related matters. The act generally provides for the filing of campaign statements and reports by various means, including personal delivery, guaranteed overnight delivery, facsimile transmission, and online transmission. The act requires the Secretary of State, in consultation with the Fair Political Practices Commission, to develop online and electronic filing processes for persons and entities that are required to file statements and reports with the Secretary of State's office. The act requires certain persons and entities to file online or electronically with the Secretary of State if their political contributions, expenditures, or loans reach specified monetary thresholds. This bill would generally recast certain provisions governing the processing of campaign reports and statements to provide for the filing, verification, delivery, amendment, retention, and inspection of those documents online or electronically, as prescribed. The bill would repeal the above-mentioned monetary thresholds, thereby making the online and electronic filing requirements applicable to all specified filers. The bill would also repeal various obsolete or extraneous provisions of the act, and would make conforming and other technical, nonsubstantive changes. The act requires each committee that is required to file a statement of organization to pay the Secretary of State a fee of $50 by January 15 of each year until the committee is terminated. The act subjects a committee that fails to pay the fee on time to a penalty equal to three times the amount of the fee. This bill would change the deadline for payment of the annual fee to April 30 of each year. The bill would delete obsolete provisions and would make other technical, nonsubstantive changes. Existing law requires print advertisements paid for by certain committees to disclose, among other things, the top contributors to the committee and a statement that funding details for the advertisement are published on the Internet Web site of the Fair Political Practices Commission. This bill would instead require the funding details statement to direct a reader to the lists of top contributors published on the Internet Web site of the Secretary of State. A violation of the act is punishable as a misdemeanor, and reports and statements filed under the act are required to be signed under the penalty of perjury. By expanding the scope of existing crimes, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. This bill would incorporate additional changes to Section 84504.2 of the Government Code proposed by Assembly Bill 2155 to be operative only if this bill and Assembly Bill 2155 are enacted and this bill is enacted last. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason. The Political Reform Act of 1974, an initiative measure, provides that the Legislature may amend the act to further the act's purposes upon a 23 vote of each house of the Legislature and compliance with specified procedural requirements. This bill would declare that it furthers the purposes of the act.