Anaheim Insider here. Last week, the Orange County Register reported that the California Fair Political Practices Commission is fining trash hauler George Briggeman Jr. $15,000 for money laundering in connection with his 2012 contributions to the Taxpayers for Safer Neighborhoods political action committee. This PAC paid for mail supporting then-council candidates Lucille Kring and John Leos and attacking Jordan Brandman. ...

Anaheim Insider here. Last week, Mayor Tom Tait tried and failed to convince his City Council colleagues to increase his council assistant budget from $60,000 to $100,000 a year. It was a long, contentious discussion. Tait’s council assistant, Mishal Montgomery, is the only council assistant who is vested in the CALPERS retirement system. Consequently, employing her under those circumstances is ...

Jose Moreno’s city council campaign e-mailed out this fundraising invite today: Dear Friend, With Election Day arriving in less than 9 weeks the Dr. Jose F. Moreno campaign is sprinting towards the finish line, BUT WE NEED YOUR HELP! October is Voter Outreach Month and our community-centered campaign needs YOUR help more than ever to raise the money that we ...

One of the arguments made by single-member council district proponents is that Anaheim is so big that the cost of communicating with so many voters prices potential candidates out of the running – especially Latinos – and allows special interests to dominate the elections. Carving the city into single-member council districts, the argument goes, diminishes the significance of campaign warchests ...

My frend Chris Emami at OC Political has posted about an Anaheim Campaign Database project he is launching. It is a worthy endeavor, and the information about council candidates is useful. I do have some suggestions for making it more complete. The profiles of the candidates’ campaign finances don’t include how much of their own mony they donated to their campaigns. Brian Chuchua, for ...

The year-end Form 460s — those are campaign finance disclosure forms — were due yesterday, but a number of them were filed over the course of January. I opened up the Form 460 for the OCEA-sponsored “Committee to Support John Leos for Anaheim City Council 2012,” and did a double take when I saw the final total spending on behalf ...

Like the county’s TIN CUP ordinance, the city’s campaign ordinance allows the city council to increase the campaign contribution limit in January of odd-numbered years, to account for increases in the Consumer Price Index. In practice, that translates into $100 increase every two years. On Tuesday, the Council will bump the limit from $1,800 to $1,900. For many years, the contribution limit ...

I’d like to share some more thoughts about last week’s OC Register editorial, especially the worrying about “hastily” putting the GardenWalk agreement on the agenda and concern that “other interested parties deserve more notice.” The GardenWalk agreement isn’t exactly being rushed back to the City Council. The judge’s decision voiding the council’s January 2012 approval came out on December 10. ...

Last night, the Anaheim City Council appointed Diane Quezada-Singer to fill the Anaheim Public Utilities Board vacancy created by Jordan Brandman’s election to the Anaheim City Council. Singer lives in Anaheim Hills and is an elected trustee of the Orange Unified School District, representing Area 1.  She briefly explored running for the Anaheim City Council in 2008 before deciding against it. Three ...

Jordan Brandman’s election to the Anaheim City Council created a vacancy on the Anaheim Public Utilities Board, which is charged with “making recommendations to the City Council concerning the operation of electric, water and other public utilities under the management of the Public Utilities Department.” On the agenda for Tuesday’s City Council meeting is filling this vacancy from a list ...