Clean elections reform discussed

MOSES LAKE — The Grant County Democrats sponsored a meeting Monday about election reform in Washington State.

Matt Hedman, field organizer with Washington Public Campaigns spoke on clean elections at the firehouse in Moses Lake.

He introduced the concept by showing a video about clean elections in which some politicians speak on how they've improved campaigning, in their opinions.

The video revealed seven states and the cities of Portland, Ore., and Albuquerque, N.M., passed clean elections bills.

The clean elections process is intended to avoid special interests in politics by creating campaigns run by public funds, not larger corporate contributions.

Arizona and Maine started practicing clean elections in 2000 and Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano speaks in the video about a benefit she saw in her clean campaign, which was her ability to focus less on fundraising and more on speaking with constituents. Other potential benefits discussed were the opportunity for a more diverse group of candidates to run and the passing of legislation some feel may not have passed if special interests affected voting. An example given were prescription drug bills reducing costs to consumers.

A vote on clean elections is coming to Washington State.

"We're going to know in a matter of weeks if this ship is going to sail," Hedman said.

A proposed bill in Washington State works similarly to the measures in Arizona and Maine by providing public funds for state executive, legislative and judicial campaigns.

Candidates would build seed money of about $500 dollars through donations and could receive support of about $5 from 250 constituents per district.

Hedman said this is a framework of how it would work and the details are not set in stone, but this is similar to other states' processes.

The state may grant matching funds to allow responses to television commercials.