The Nassau County Legislature voted unanimously last week to approve a bill requiring county vendors and their principals to disclose contributions to candidates for county elective office.
You might think this is a step in the right direction, but this is the Nassau County Legislature.
There are two problems with the legislation.
The campaign contributions of vendors were already available to the Legislature in filings to the Nassau County Board of Elections.
More important, the Legislature failed to require vendors to disclose contributions to political clubs, political committees or PACs.
And legislators can’t say they were unaware of the problem with that.
Just days before their vote, Newsday reported that Rob Walker, chief deputy to Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano, sought donations from county vendors for a golf outing run by Walker’s Hicksville Republican Committee.
According to Newsday, at least 87 percent of the money raised was contributed by companies had done business with Nassau County over the past six years. Some of the $58,350 raised by the event went to Walker’s mother, Rose Marie Walker, a Republican county legislator from Hicksville, who won re-election.
The next day Newsday reported that VIP Splash Waterways Group won a $12 million storm cleanup contract from the county that was signed by Walker on the same day VIP Splash Waterways made its donation to the committee.
The request for proposal for the project was formed two days after VIP Splash Waterways was formed, according to the paper.
And the fundraiser took place on Sept. 24 — just two months before Walked acknowledged during testimony at the corruption trial of former Sen. Dean Skelos that he is under investigation for allegedly awarding county contracts to campaign contributors.
Skelos and his son, Adam, were convicted on Dec. 10 of eight counts of bribery, extortion and conspiracy that included Skelos’ efforts to help Adam him consulting payments at AbTech Industries by lobbying the county for a $12 million water treatment project.
So how do political committees get exempted from the legislation?
Of course, Legislature Presiding Officer Norma Gonsalves might have been distracted.
She was recently the subject of the first hearing of state’s new enforcement unit that investigates potential violations of state campaign laws. Newsday reported in February that Gonsalves violated state election laws at least 33 times over nine years by failing to disclose political donors and campaign expenses for Friends for Norma Gonsalves, a previously unregistered campaign committee that she controls. Newsday reported that a spokesman for Gonsalves said deficiencies have been corrected by the campaign committee.
On Dec. 23, the enforcement attorney for the state Board of Elections accused Gonsalves of 10 counts of failing to file campaign-finance disclosure reports.
But Gonsaves was focused enough to join the other 18 county legislators in voting to nearly double their pay from $39,500 to $75,000, effective January 2018.
Supporters said the pay increase was needed to increase the number — and presumably — the quality of candidates.
That doesn’t appear to be a very high bar to clear.
