Politics & Government
Highland becomes first city in Utah to restrict developer donations in city elections
The Highland City Council took on campaign finance during their Aug. 6 meeting. The small north Utah County city became Utah’s first city to restrict campaign donations from applicants seeking a land use or city code approval.
“This has not as much to do with reacting to a concern that I may have had in past campaigns as much as it is protecting the potential of a conflict. Up to $1,000, I don’t think that’s a big deal. Over $1,000 starts to get into the area of, ‘Are you donating because the person is someone you want in there, or are you donating because you want an outcome?’ and that concerns me,” said councilman Ron Campbell, who brought the agenda item to the City Council.
The new restrictions prohibit donations over $500 from any person or entity with a land use or code amendment application that was filed or pending approval within one calendar year of election. Corrective action is permitted and orders the candidate to refund the donor. The first infraction after that is a fine of $750, or 50% of the donation amount, whichever is lower. The second infraction would result in the candidate being disqualified from the election.
“Federal courts have upheld donation restrictions. It is somewhat of a restriction on speech. Donations are considered speech, but we are allowed to regulate them as long as we don’t regulate the content and focus on important government interestsand specific issues,” said Highland City Attorney Rob Patterson when questioned on the constitutionality of donation restrictions.
The Council was not unanimously in support of the proposed changes.
“Sometimes when we see a problem and think of a solution to fix it, it ends up with more problems and, for me, this is one of those issues. If you have a developer come in and want to donate to someone’s campaign and they have a land use issue, is there a way to not allow them to just donate as an individual? So instead, they say ‘OK, I can’t donate more than $1,000, so as an individual, I’m going to donate $6000,” asked councilwoman Kim Rodela.
“So, the financial disclosure now has a resident name, and I’m not seeing the developer’s name on there… I actually think it leads to less transparency,” continued Rodela.
“If there are bad actors out there, they will always find a way around,” replied Mayor Kurt Ostler.
“It is tied to whoever filed the application. So, if Kurt Ostler 1 LLC filed the application and Kurt Ostler 2 LLC made the donation, those are two different entities and wouldn’t have the restriction,” added Patterson.
“I think this sets a nice tone for the residents to know, we’re not going to allow ourselves to go down that path. We want to set limits on ourselves. Is it bulletproof? No. Will people go around it, possibly. I want people to know we care about it,” concluded Campbell, who sponsored the change.
“If someone takes money from developers, I want to see that. It may sway my vote,” said Rodela to conclude the discussion.
Councilman Doug Cortney then motioned to lower the proposed limit of $1,000 to $500. The motion passed on a 3-1-1 vote. The original proposal with the amended $500 limit was then passed by a 4-1 vote. Rodela dissented.
