The state’s Public Disclosure Commission fined Sen. Ann Rivers, R-La Center, $4,000 on Thursday for violating state campaign finance law.
The state commission suspended $3,000 as long as there are no other violations within four years, giving Rivers 60 days to pay the $1,000. The public disclosure officer who investigated the case said he believed the error in reporting was unintentional and that there was no malicious wrongdoing.
“I’m pleased to have a clean bill of health with the (Public Disclosure Commission),” Rivers said after the hearing. “And I’m happy there was no finding of malfeasance and my PDC (filings) are in order.”
Through electronic filing, $182,000 in contributions were carried forward from 2012 incorrectly. The error was never caught, so going into 2014 and 2015 it compounded and made it look like Rivers’ campaign war chest was greater than it actually was. At one point, it went from listing more than $255,000 to $80,000.
In October 2015, Kelly Hinton, a local conservative blogger, filed a complaint and alleged Rivers was intentionally overstating her finances to dissuade potential candidates from running against her. His complaints spurred the Public Disclosure Commission to investigate.
Hinton said on Thursday that he doesn’t believe Rivers was unaware of the filing error.
“Sen. Rivers had been an elected official for at least the better part of 5 years in both the House and the Senate when this issue came up and had acted as a campaign consultant for several years before that; she knows PDC regulation and laws inside and out, perhaps even better than I do,” Hinton said in an email. “I had no problem realizing there was an issue with one glance at the records in question; all politicians frequently view their PDC (filings) over the months, and that includes Sen. Rivers. She had to know this was wrong.”
To rectify the situation, Rivers’ campaign had to file a slew of amended reports, which made it more difficult for the public to track her campaign finances.
Rivers said she has retained a firm that solely dedicates itself to public disclosure reports and has a history of not making errors.
