Rodriguez helped make the quorum Wednesday night.
Just as the Democracy Fund got a long-awaited new member to join and help make an elusive quorum, its oldest member announced he plans to quit.
Former Westville alder Sergio Rodriguez has become the fifth member of the Fund, which oversees New Haven’s public-financing program for mayoral elections. Rodriguez showed up for the board’s monthly meeting at City Hall Wednesday night, helping produce an unusual feat: the Fund had a quorum and could officially meet.
Then, at the end of the meeting, Treasurer Tyrone McClain announced he will leave the seven-member board. Prior to Rodriguez joining, the board had only four of seven spots filled, which is exactly the number needed for quorum. If any member failed to show up to the meeting, no business could be conducted.
As a result, the Fund has struggled to hold meetings – it was unable to meet at all from October to January. This past February’s meeting was also postponed to Wednesday due to lack of quorum.
Fortunately for the quorum-seekers, McClain, who has served on the board since November 2012, said he will stay on until a new member is found to replace him.
During Wednesday’s meeting, McClain had to take a phone call during the meeting – a sign of being busy with work, a reason he gave for his departure.
“I’ve been here [on this board] for a long time, and I’m starting to get burned out. It’s also starting to really conflict with work so that when I’m here, I’m not totally here,” said McClain (pictured). “But it’s been fun, and I’ve enjoyed my time.”
Rodriguez, who served as a Westville alder for 10 years and unsuccessfully ran for city clerk in 2013, said he joined the board because he believes in public financing and hopes to make a contribution based on his personal experiences running campaigns. He used the state public finance system when he ran for Connecticut state representative in 2010 and called the public money “very helpful.”
“I ran for city clerk, and one of the biggest challenges I had was raising money, especially because it was one of those positions people didn’t really know a lot about,” Rodriguez said. “Public financing wasn’t open to me and I went up against folks who raised money I couldn’t raise, and it would’ve been really helpful. With another $20,000, I probably could’ve won that race.” He argued that New Haven should publicly fund city clerk races.
Rodriguez was less clear on what he thinks about potentially extending public financing to alder campaigns. The Fund is currently conducting a survey of alders and researching the idea. Rodriguez says he doesn’t see a need right now for funding alderman races, but it could open up the opportunity to run to more people and a modified form of the current program could help alders.
Wednesday’s meeting also revisited the question of increasing the ceiling on matching funds. The Fund gives government funds to qualifying mayoral candidates to help fund their campaigns in exchange for a promise not to take corporate and PAC money. Starting in 2008, many figures were to be adjusted every four years for cost-of-living increases using the Consumer Price Index (CPI).
Figures such as the individual contribution ceiling, the initial grant qualifying candidates receive, and the limit on total expenditures of candidates’ campaigns were all adjusted in 2012 based on the CPI (from $300 to $370, $15,000 to $19,000, and $300,000 to $368,000, respectively; the ordinance requires new values to be rounded either to the nearest $5 or near $1,000 depending on the value).
However, the Fund’s rules make it unclear whether the $25 limit on matching funds should also be adjusted for cost-of-living. Currently, the city matches all qualifying donations 2:1 until $25, so a $10 donation becomes $30 and a $25 donation becomes $75.
Administrator Heimer (left) and Chair Milfred (right).
At Wednesday’s meeting, the board voted to adjust the $25 ceiling as well, making the ceiling $30. Now, a $30 donation becomes $90, whereas it previously would have been $80. Chair Jared Milfred noted that this was simply adjusting the figure for inflation in the same way the other figures were already adjusted.
“This would also increase the power of low dollar donors, which is to a certain extent the entire point of having matching funds in the first place,” administrator Alyson Heimer added.
"Is The Democracy Fund Hexed?"
The proper fitted question is:
Is the democracy fund Xed?
Well guess what Sergio? In the 2014/15 budget the democracy fund was not funded ten cents.
In the current 2015/16 budget the democracy fund line item was removed by the mayor as a funded line item, so I guess your services will not be needed afterall.