City Fines Councilman for Post-Election Fundraising

By Alison St John / Reporter, KPBS Public Broadcasting

Published March 9, 2007 at 12:34 PM PST

This story was published more than 17 years ago.

San Diego's Ethics Commission has fined City Councilman Tony Young $10,000 for continuing to collect money 18 months after his special election in 2005. KPBS reporter Alison St John has more.

San Diego's Ethics Commission has fined City Councilman Tony Young $10,000 for continuing to collect money 18 months after his special election in 2005. KPBS reporter Alison St John has more.

Stacey Fulhorst, of the City Ethics Commission, says the fine could have been larger, but the commission took into account the fact that Young's special election was called on relatively short notice after his predecessor, Charles Lewis, died.

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Fulhorst says the commission believes it's important to enforce the laws that elected officials stop fundraising to pay off campaign debts three months after an election.

Fulhorst : People who tend to give contributions for a candidate far after an election are typically people who have business pending before the city.

Nearly half of the money Young raised in his election bid came from developers or construction companies. He continued fundraising after the election in order to pay off promised bonuses to his campaign staff.

The Ethics Commission was founded nearly six years ago by former Mayor Dick Murphy, and has stepped up its enforcement activity in recent years. Alison St John, KPBS news.

Alison St John

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Alison St John currently serves as a general assignment reporter and occasionally co-hosts KPBS Midday Edition. She fell in love with KPBS Radio when she arrived in San Diego in 1985 and first heard NPR. She has been a voice on KPBS Radio since 1989, and has served as a news reporter for radio, TV and the web, as well as anchoring, hosting, producing and editing. Alison has reported on stories about North County and was based in the KPBS' North County Bureau. Alison covered the metro beat during the critical period of the San Diego City pension crisis, and the education beat while Alan Bersin was the controversial Superintendent of San Diego City School District. She covered health when the industry was converting to managed care and told welfare reform stories in the late 1990s when Clinton was “ending welfare as we know it.” She has covered land use issues extensively, looking at the challenges of meeting a growing population while preserving community character, and developing a better transportation system to meet environmental concerns. She has done many stories on the military in San Diego, and the series she edited on the challenges veterans face returning from active duty to civilian life won “Best of Show” from the San Diego Society of Professional Journalists. She occasionally hosts the KPBS Roundtable and KPBS Midday Edition. Alison has won awards from the San Diego Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press TV and Radio Association, and the California Golden Mike Awards. Alison was born in Tanzania, brought up in Scotland, and earned her degree in psychology and sociology from Durham University in England. Her postgraduate diploma is in student counseling. She worked in England, Nigeria, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and Japan before moving to the United States in 1981. She now lives in Oceanside and enjoys how her community is growing and changing.