Vitali leads rally for Senate vote on campaign finance reform
Vitali said his measure, which is part of a bill the House passed 106-91 in March, represents the first step in reducing the disproportionate influence that large political donors have in Pennsylvania's elections. The bill must be voted out of committee, passed by the full Senate and signed by the governor before the end of November, or it will die.
Representatives from several groups supporting the legislation joined the rally, including Common Cause, AARP, the League of Women Voters, PennPIRG, Citizens for Pennsylvania's Future, the Sierra Club, the Keystone Research Center and the Pennsylvania State Council of Senior Citizens.
The bill (H.B. 548) has support from House and Senate members on both sides of the aisle. Sen. Alan Kukovich, D-Westmoreland, and Sen. Joe Conti, R-Bucks, spoke at the rally.
The bill now is in the Senate State Government Committee, chaired by Sen. Charles Lemmond, R-Luzerne. Vitali urged citizens across Pennsylvania to contact Lemmond, their own state senators and the governor to push for quick passage of the legislation.
"We have a significant opportunity before this legislative session is over to remove Pennsylvania from the very short list of states that have taken no action to put the people back at the forefront of the political process," Vitali said. "Pennsylvanians need to remind their senators that they are tired of having their political worth depend upon their net worth."
Vitali's Pennsylvania Gubernatorial Public Financing Act would establish a public financing system for governor and lieutenant governor races in primary and general elections in Pennsylvania. Candidates who agree to spending limits would receive up to $7.8 million in public financing. The program, which would be entirely voluntary, would be financed by a $5 checkoff on Pennsylvania Personal Income Tax forms and a General Fund budget appropriation. "To those who decry the idea of publicly financed election campaigns, I ask: to whom would you rather have Pennsylvania's gubernatorial candidates beholden –- the taxpayers of Pennsylvania or the special interests and big-time political donors?" Vitali said.
"The fact of the matter is, the amount of private money that candidates need to raise these days to run for governor or lieutenant governor is scaring some of the best people away and taking the average voter out of the process," he said. "This bill represents an important first step in changing that."
Vitali's legislation is modeled after a successful New Jersey law that resulted in gubernatorial races in that state that are very competitive (the last two were decided by less than 1 percent of the vote) and that focus on the issues.
Vitali, D-Delaware, is Democratic vice chairman of the House State Government Committee. More information about the Gubernatorial Public Financing Act, campaign finance reform in Pennsylvania, and other good-government issues is available on his Web page at www.gregvitali.com.