Council Moves To Annul Union Campaign Limit

Council Moves To Annul Union Campaign Limit;  Bill Considers Locals Independent; Mayor Likely to Veto

The Chief-Leader/Adrienne Haywood-James NEED STANDARD OF PROOF: City Council Member Peter F. Vallone Jr. abstained on a bill lifting restrictions on union political contributions because he believed it did too little to ensure that locals from the same union were not collaborating on endorsements of candidates for city offices.

By RICHARD STEIER

The City Council Nov. 16 overwhelmingly approved a bill that would overturn the Campaign Finance Board's restriction on political contributions that makes a union local ineligible to give to a candidate who has already received the maximum contribution from that local's parent union or another of its locals.

Mayor Bloomberg, who was lobbied on the issue by the AFL-CIO New York City Central Labor Council prior to receiving its endorsement for re-election, indicated he would veto the bill, even though he does not quarrel with its intent.

Have Votes to Override

But the 44 votes in favor, with just three Council Members voting against and one abstaining, indicates that there would be enough votes to override a mayoral veto.

PETER L. GORMAN: Unions act on own. "The [CFB] change was very ill-advised," Uniformed Fire Officers' Association President Peter L. Gorman said the following day in a phone interview.

The CFB intended the change, which it approved in March, to limit the influence unions could potentially exert in political campaigns at the city level if one or more locals joined with their parent union in giving the maximum allowable contribution. (The limits vary based on the office involved: the maximum for mayoral candidates is $4,500; for those running for City Council, it is $2,750.)

The CFB urged the Mayor to veto the bill, saying it took "the unprecedented step of weakening the city's Campaign Finance Program by creating a loophole for one special interest group."

The board's statement argued that the Council legislation "has the effect of allowing multiple union contributions that exceed the limits and that are in fact controlled by the same decision-maker(s). No one can deny that this legislation would allow this, even if it may well occur infrequently."

CFB Hearings Set

The CFB will consider the issue further at hearings scheduled for Dec. 12 and 13, and invited unions and elected officials to testify.

Mr. Gorman is among those officials who argue that locals typically decide on campaign endorsements independent of each other, and so it is unfair to penalize them in cases where they decide to back the same candidate. His own union's history illustrates the point. The UFOA is an affiliate of the International Association of Firefighters, as is the Uniformed Firefighters' Association. But in 2004, when the UFOA joined the IAFF in backing John Kerry for President, the UFA supported President Bush's re-election. In this year's Democratic mayoral primary, the UFA backed Anthony Weiner and the UFOA remained neutral; in the general election, the roles were reversed, with the UFOA backing Mr. Bloomberg and the UFA taking no position, even though the latter union had just reached contract terms with the Mayor.

'CFB Too Restrictive'

"Every local has different needs and different interests," Mr. Gorman said. "I think the [CFB] law was much too restrictive."

Another example of the shifting alliances and independent decision-making can be found at District Council 37, whose 121,000 members are grouped within 56 separate locals.

The union's executive director, Lillian Roberts, has been engaged in a bitter feud with a reform wing of the union led by Local 371 President Charles Ensley and Mark Rosenthal, who heads Local 983. But Ms. Roberts and Mr. Rosenthal both endorsed Mr. Bloomberg; Mr. Ensley, after criticizing Ms. Roberts's decision as violating the union's normal endorsement process, remained neutral in the contest.

Mr. Bloomberg told reporters that he favored the lifting of the restriction, but that the action should come from the CFB, not a body whose members rely heavily on union contributions in their re-election campaigns.

Not One to Talk?

"The conflict for the City Council is insurmountable," he said. "It shouldn't be passing laws out of self-interest."

Captain Gorman, notwithstanding his election support of Mr. Bloomberg, questioned whether the Mayor himself was in a position to view the matter objectively.

"As someone who funded his own campaign, who didn't follow the Campaign Finance Board rules [imposing spending limits], should he be involving himself in it?" the UFOA leader asked. He noted that any self-financed candidate would benefit from restricting the contributions that could be made to his or her opponent.

The Council Member who abstained on the bill, Peter F. Vallone Jr., took the opposite view from the Mayor, saying he believed it was the Council's job to legislate union political activity but that the bill itself was flawed.

'Like Trusting Palmeiro'

"The proof required of independence [in deciding on endorsements] is ridiculously low," Mr. Vallone said in an interview following the vote. "It's the equivalent of allowing Rafael Palmeiro to self-certify that he's not on steroids."

He was referring to the fact that the bill deems locals to be acting independently "if those labor organizations: 1) make contributions from different accounts; 2) maintain separate accounts with different signatories; 3) do not share a majority of members of their governing boards; and 4) do not share a majority of the officers of their governing boards." Nothing in the bill bars local presidents from discussing endorsements with each other and coordinating strategy. A memo from the Council Governmental Affairs Division stated that the CFB provision required campaigns to determine whether locals were acting independently and contended that by increasing the burden for verifying compliance it "could have a potentially chilling effect on the willingness of candidates to accept contributions from unions."

'Gives Workers a Voice'

The sentiment in favor of the bill was summed up by Brooklyn Council Member David Yassky. Noting the presence in the gallery of the City Council Chambers of a political science class from Harry Van Arsdale High School, he said it was appropriate that students from a school named for the late labor leader witness the Council "ensuring the rights of working people to be heard in the political process."