Public Comment

A right-wing PAC funded entirely by the Berkeley Property Owners Association, the Los Angeles police union, and the corporate insurance industry illegally hid its major funders in a hit piece attacking progressive Soli Alpert 

This week, the Berkeley People’s Alliance (BPA) filed an amended complaint with the City of Berkeley’s Fair Campaign Practices Commission against “Californians for Safety and Security,” a right-wing PAC based in Sacramento and funded entirely by the Berkeley Property Owners Association, the Los Angeles police union, and the Personal Insurance Federation Committee. The PAC launched numerous hit pieces against City Council candidate Soli Alpert. 

The Berkeley Election Reform Act (BERA) requires most communications by PACs about city elections to include a disclosure of who the PAC’s major funders are. The PAC received $5,000 from the Personal Insurance Federation Committee two weeks before launching its hit pieces and is required to disclose that corporate funding on its communications. But this right-wing PAC has refused to comply with this basic and crucial sunshine requirement in its numerous hit pieces against Alpert, choosing instead to illegally hide its corporate funding in order to trick voters and buy a city council seat for its favored candidates. BPA originally filed numerous campaign finance complaints with the city in late May. 

After the election ended, BPA discovered even more rampant violations by the PAC. These included additional hit pieces that illegally failed to list the PAC’s major funders, a failure to declare under penalty of perjury that they did not coordinate with any candidates (known as a form 462), and illegally filing all of their campaign finance reports in a way that minimizes transparency. 

“It is clear that Berkeley’s largest landlords, out-of-town cops, and the insurance industry were willing to stop at nothing to buy this City Council seat,” said BPA Treasurer George Lippman. “And it’s clear that they blatantly violated the law in order to do so.” 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 

The City’s Fair Campaign Practices Commission meets tonight at 6:30PM at City Hall to vote on beginning an investigation into these numerous violations. Additionally, Berkeley Municipal Code 2.12.460 makes it a misdemeanor to knowingly or willfully violate the Berkeley Election Reform Act. 

Berkeley People’s Alliance is a community alliance of local organizations dedicated to advancing social, racial, economic, and environmental justice in the City of Berkeley.h