By George Fallar 
You would think receiving a letter that levied a $75,000 fine against your organization would get your attention and maintain it for awhile.
In the case of the chairman and treasurer of three Glendale political committees? Not so much.
File The Reports
Independent expenditure (IE) and political action committees (PAC) must file campaign finance reports for every period they are active. Often, this filing will be a “no activity” report, yet it still must be filed.
Once the reports are filed with the Glendale City Clerk’s office, they are made public on the city website. Click here for the current page.
There are 32 PACs and IEs listed on the page. 10 of those did not file any campaign finance report.
Four of those committees weren’t formed prior to the June 30 deadline, so no report was required.
The other six committees should have filed reports and had not as of July 13.
Coincidentally, a visit to the Glendale City Clerk’s office on another matter revealed a stack of certified letters in the “outbox”. It’s highly likely the Clerk’s office is sending reminder notices to the delinquent committees about their missing reports and their $10 per day late fee fine.
Repeat Repeat Offender
Half of those six committees that didn’t file are under the auspices of chairman Gary Hirsch and treasurer Jill Ryan.
If those names sound familiar, it’s because they were responsible for a long string of campaign finance reporting violations over the past several years.
One set of those violations netted the “Respect the Promise” PAC a $75,000 fine from the City of Glendale (click here for story). While that fine was later held in abeyance due to a Supreme Court ruling, that fine can now be reinstated based on now effective legislation.
Name Sounds Familiar
If the Hirsch name sounds familiar, his most recent foray in front of the Glendale City Council prompted a response (click here) because his facts were foggy and he offered yet another personal insult directed at a councilmember in council chambers.
Hirsch’s “Neighbors for a Better Glendale” IE funded the initial failed attempt to recall CM Gary Sherwood and a couple failed referendum attempts aimed at the Tohono O’odham casino in Glendale.
Complaints Made
A complaint letter (click here) was delivered to the City Clerk and the City Attorney today (July 13, 2015) regarding three Hirsch/Ryan committees that once again didn’t bother to follow the simple rules the majority of other committees in Glendale managed to comply with.
We’re certain the complaint will be dismissed as some sort of retribution for Hirsch’s most recent City Council harangue, but it’s not. Oddly enough, it was a simple circumstance of going through other campaign finance reports that the lack of a report from the three committees became apparent.
Honestly, there was no way we expected to see these people “forget” to file yet another set of finance reports considering the ordeal they went through last year for the same thing. The Glendale City Clerk even sends out reminder emails to assist those with faulty memories.
Seriously, to NOT file these reports, you almost have to be doing so on purpose.
To paraphrase something Mr. Hirsch said at the June 23 Glendale City Council meeting regarding the cavalier attitude he and his committees have demonstrated with huge sums of campaign money and the reporting of same:
…always watch your wallet around Mr. Hirsch.
Hilarious line, isn’t it?