Clean-Money Fund Changes Proposed

The board that oversees New Haven’s public-financing program has officially submitted a suite of proposed changes that would allow candidates running for city clerk, and not just for mayor, to tap into the clean-money effort — and that would reduce the amount of money that wealthy self-funders can put into their own campaigns and still participate and receive public dollars.

Those are just a few of the changes included in a proposed ordinance amendment that the New Haven Democracy Fund Board recently submitted to the Board of Alders. 

If adopted by the full Board of Alders, the ordinance amendment would allow eligible candidates for mayor and for city clerk to participate in the public-financing program. It would lower the maximum individual campaign donation that participating candidates can accept from $445 to $400. And it would reduce the amount that participating candidates can contribute out of their own pockets to their own campaigns from $23,000 to $1,500.

These proposed changes and many more are all part of an ordinance amendment that was included as a communication on the local legislature’s meeting agenda on Jan. 17. The recommended updates now advance to an aldermanic committee for review before returning to the full Board of Alders for a final vote.

The proposed ordinance amendment pertains to the city’s Democracy Fund, a pioneering municipal public-financing program that began in 2007 and that aims to limit the influence of special interests and encourage more candidates to participate in mayoral races. It does that by providing an initial public grant and matching funds to eligible mayoral candidates who agree to cap individual donations and swear off contributions from political committees.

Those are still the goals at the top of the program’s list of priorities, Democracy Fund Administrator Aly Heimer said in a Wednesday interview. She said that the proposed changes included in this newly requested ordinance update will only strengthen and clarify the program. 

And she said that she plans to ask the alders to make these proposed changes, if adopted, effective as of Jan. 1, 2024, so that they do not apply to the already underway 2023 mayoral race. 

Of the three Democrats running in the mayoral primary so far, only incumbent Mayor Justin Elicker, a longtime supporter of and participant in the Democracy Fund, has committed to using the public-financing program again. Tom Goldenberg isn’t; Shafiq Abdussabur hasn’t decided yet. A fourth candidate who is currently exploring a Democratic mayoral run, Liam Brennan, has also said that he will participate in the clean-money effort if he makes his campaign official.

“New Haven’s Democracy Fund is a successful program,” Heimer told the Independent, pointing to how Democratic and Republican mayoral candidates alike participated in the program in 2021. She also said that the number of unique individuals who have donated to New Haven mayoral campaigns over the past 15 years has increased.

“That’s why we want to make these changes that would strengthen the ordinance and enable the program to continue for years to come, and also widen it to allow for additional offices to access the same benefits.” 

This package of proposed changes would ​“make sure that the spirit of the program is maintained and clarified so that it’s a less confusing program to use,” she continued. 

Decreasing some of the numbers — around candidate contributions to their own campaign, as well as around the individual contribution cap that eligible candidates must abide by — ​“hopefully will preserve the intent that the mayor’s race shouldn’t be about money. It should be about ideas. We want as a city to reject the idea that our highest elected municipal office and any municipal office is beholden to its donors for favors or legislative priorities or anything like that.”

City Clerk Included. Donation Cap Dropped. Self-Financers Limited

So. What exactly are the changes included in this ordinance amendment proposal?

Click here to read a one-page summary of the recommended changes, and click here to read line-by-line proposed revisions to the local law. Some of those proposed changes include:

• Since its inception a decade and a half ago, the Democracy Fund has only ever been open to eligible candidates running for mayor. If these proposed changes are adopted, candidates running for city clerk as well as those running for mayor would be able to participate. Heimer told the Independent that the Democracy Fund Board has also put together a proposal for a pilot program that would be open to alders and Board of Education candidates, as well as another pilot that would allow mayoral and city clerk candidates to take a ​“Democracy Fund pledge” that commits them to abiding by the program’s rules even if they don’t want to accept the public money. From what the Independent can tell, those latter proposals — related to alders, Board of Ed candidates, and the ​“Democracy Fund pledge” — are not included in the actual legislative item now before the Board of Alders.

• The Democracy Fund currently allows participating candidates to accept individual donations of up to $445 (which is based off of inflation-induced increases over time to the $300 cap written into local law.) This new proposal would drop that individual-donation cap to $400, and it would tie increases in that amount to inflation. It would also codify a recent drop to the minimum-level contribution eligible for public matching from $10 to $5.

• The fund currently provides an initial public grant of $23,000 to candidates who qualify to participate. This new proposal would increase the initial public grant amount to $25,000.

• This proposal would also codify the matchable contribution limit of $35 (up from the $25 limit currently written into the law.) That means that, if an eligible candidate receives a $10 donation, the fund will double that amount and pay the candidate another $20; if that candidate receives a $25 donation, the fund will pay the candidate $50; if the candidate receives a $35 donation, the fund will pay the candidate $70; but if the candidate receives a donation that is greater than $35, the fund will still pay that candidate only $70 for that particular contribution.

• The fund currently allows participating candidates to contribute up to $23,000 of their own money to their campaigns. This proposal would drop that amount to $1,500. For context, Heimer said, the current $23,000 amount is more than what candidates running for governor are allowed to contribute to their own campaigns while still participating in the state’s clean-money program. This drop to $1,500 in allowed self-funding would bring New Haven’s program more in line with what, say, state senators are allowed to contribute to their own campaigns while still participating in the state’s clean-money program.

• Under the current city program, candidates can raise a maximum of $445,000 ​“per cycle,” and they can receive up to $125,000 in matching funds along with the initial $23,000 grant. Those numbers apply separately to primaries and general elections, and therefore can reset after a primary. This new proposal would limit the maximum amount that a participating candidate can raise to $400,000 per cycle. It would also keep the $125,000 limit for how much a candidate can receive in matching funds, while tying that number to inflation.

• In this new proposal, candidates who do not secure ballot access must return money they’ve received from the Democracy Fund to the program. Candidates must also return Democracy Fund money if their competitors drop out before the election and it winds up that they’re running in an uncontested race.

• This new proposal makes explicit a prohibition on raising money through an exploratory committee and then transferring those funds to an actual campaign committee. An ​“exploratory committee is a different committee with a different political purpose,” Heimer said. That money cannot be used for a Democracy Fund bid for an official run for office.