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Treg Taylor settles gubernatorial campaign finance complaint with state regulators
By Corinne Smith
Alaska Beacon
Alaska gubernatorial candidate Treg Taylor has agreed to pay a fine and update his campaign disclosure reports as part of a settlement with state regulators to resolve a campaign finance disclosure complaint.
The complaint challenged Taylor’s failure to disclose details of more than $187,000 in expenditures to a handful of campaign consulting businesses.
Commissioners with the Alaska Public Offices Commission, which regulates lobbying activity and financial disclosures for campaigns and elected officials, unanimously approved the settlement agreement at a hearing on Tuesday.
Taylor, a former state attorney general, is one of three Republicans plus one Democrat running for governor on the November ballot.
Taylor was previously investigated by APOC this summer after failing to properly file campaign disclosure reports on time. The commission recommended he be decertified as a candidate for governor. Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom, who oversees the Alaska Division of Elections, initially agreed but then reversed her decision and reinstated him on the ballot. Taylor has also contributed hundreds of thousands of his own money to his campaign, far exceeding the limit, and violating campaign finance laws.
The approval was one of four complaints commissioners heard on Tuesday, including complaints challenging inadequate campaign disclosures from Republican gubernatorial candidate Bernadette Wilson, and independent candidate for lieutenant governor Zac Johnson, who is running with Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins.
The complaint settled Tuesday came prior to Taylor’s decertification and reinstatement on the ballot. Christopher Constant, a former Anchorage Assembly member, made the complaint and identified 24 alleged violations, including inadequate details of how Taylor’s campaign spent more than $187,000 at several businesses.
Under Alaska law, candidates must report campaign spending. Candidates must report details about the vendors they pay for goods and services and on the purpose of the expenditures, including additional details for advertising or campaign consultants. Details are not required of law firms.
After an investigation, APOC staff found that in Taylor’s financial reports ahead of the primary election, he failed to disclose the purpose of expenditures totalling more than $187,000 to three firms and one individual. Those included 1892 Inc, a political consulting firm, where the campaign’s spending totaled more than $103,000; Fulcrum Intel, an intelligence firm, where the campaign spent more than $17,000; Sugarhouse Strategies, a political communications firm, where the campaign spent more than $26,000; and a series of monthly payments to Evan Lee totaling $40,000.
Instead, Taylor’s campaign had described the expenditures as “retainers” or “research.” APOC found that it was in violation of campaign disclosure rules.
Under the terms of the settlement, Taylor agreed to amend his campaign finance reports to include those details and full descriptions of the expenditures within five days, and pay a penalty.
Failing to provide timely and accurate reports incurs a maximum civil penalty of $50 per day under Alaska law, which resulted in an initial penalty of $8,350 for Taylor.
But APOC staff deemed there were mitigating factors, based on criteria set in statute, that warranted lowering the fine to $1,087.50. APOC staff noted it was Taylor’s first election cycle and said he had a “good filing history” and status as an “inexperienced filer,” which warranted a reduced penalty.
Kim Stone, a campaign disclosure coordinator with APOC, said Wednesday by email that he is considered to have a good filing history despite his previous failures to comply with campaign finance law because the latest violations pertain to Public Official Financial Disclosures. “For this reason, APOC treated them as separate provisions, and the violations of 26-10-CD were Mr. Taylor’s first under AS 15.13,” she said.
At the hearing on Tuesday, Chris Moses, an attorney representing Taylor, made brief comments to the commission. He said Taylor agreed with the settlement and the campaign had already prepared the updated financial reports. “Taylor has not objected to the complaint,” he told commissioners. “So we would just ask that you accept the consent agreement as proposed and close this matter out,” Moses said.
The Taylor campaign did not answer questions about the services rendered by the businesses in the complaint on Tuesday or Wednesday.
APOC is further considering complaints filed against Wilson, with decisions expected in the next few weeks. On Tuesday, commissioners decided not to take action on a complaint against Johnson after APOC staff found that the allegations of improperly disclosed income from properties in Indiana was unsubstantiated.
• Contact Mark Sabbatini at editor@juneauindependent.com or (907) 957-2306.
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