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County director gives seminar on how candidates should account for monetary donations to campaign.
The Luzerne County Elections Bureau gets lots of questions from political candidates and their committee members about what forms need to be filled out to properly report campaign donations and expenses.
So Elections Bureau Director Leonard Piazza developed a two-hour course for Saturday afternoon for candidates and their finance chairpersons to answer questions and familiarize them with the proper documents on how to fill them out.
Piazza said he is not required to present these courses, but he does so as a courtesy.
“I think the seminars go great every time. It is great to get people together and answer the questions. It is very helpful to the candidates. It is something extra we do to help them out,” he said.
Among the things that were learned:
• Any candidate who has not waived the filing of a short form, must file a campaign finance statement with the county’s election bureau.
• Some candidates have to submit only the one-page campaign finance statement if they receive and spend less than $250 and did not execute the waiver. Those spending and receiving more than $250 must file the long campaign finance report.
“At the end of the day, campaign finance reports issues are the responsibility of the campaign treasurer,” Piazza said to the 12 people who attended the seminar.
Also, he pointed out that any candidate with a committee should have two separate people serve as chairman and treasurer, and neither of those people can be the candidate.
Any contributor giving $10 or more must be accounted for. Campaigns must get the person’s name, address, date of contribution and amount.
Any donations of $50 or more must be documented on the long campaign finance report. If a person attends a fundraising dinner for $30 and then contributes $30 in cash, that person must be listed as a contributor on the report because during the course of the campaign they donated more than $50.
No candidate may receive more than $100 in cash from any one person during a campaign cycle. If a donation of more than $100 is received, the money must be in the form of a check or money order.
Nancy Griffith of the Wilkes-Barre Township Democrats has attended three to four seminars Piazza has presented. She said she learns something every time.
“The training you get gives you so much confidence when filing out a report. Even the other questions people ask you learn from,” Griffith said.
The informational session this upcoming Saturday has been canceled, Piazza said. He anticipates having more seminars in 2011 when municipal races are on the ballot again.