Litigation

WV Public Financing Pilot Program Takes Off

By Peter Hardin

A pilot public financing program for the 2012 West Virginia Supreme Court elections has received its first contributions, along with public statements of support.

A group called The Citizens for Clean Elections held a news conference this week to commend the pilot campaign financing initiative, and to report the receipt of its first $1,800 in donations, according to a WTRF TV report.

?For a long time, due to some high-profile examples, West Virginia has been the poster child for corrupt and money-influenced elections,? said Julie Archer of the West Virginia Citizen Action Group. ?This pilot program is a step in the right direction to eliminate that perception.?

Delegate Nancy Peoples Guthrie, D-Kanawha, described public financing as the ?Supreme Court?s gift to the people, ? and she added, ?I do not want my face on a flyer mailed to 4,000 constituents putting me in poor light financed by a mystery organization.”

The law was passed in part because of public revulsion over the state?s 2004 Supreme Court election, in which a coal executive spent $3 million to elect a new justice while the executive’s company appealed a $50 million jury award.

You can learn more about the West Virginia statute, its background, and the Justice at Stake Campaign’s praise for it, from Gavel Grab.

Full post as published by The Gavel on November 18, 2010 (boomark / email).