Campaign finance no-nos uncovered

From City Hall:

A complicated web of coordinated activities, shared resources and staff, and quiet money transfers between the Working Families Party, a secretive private company called Data and Field Services and at least six current Council campaigns, as well as Bill de Blasio’s campaign for public advocate, appears to have found several ways around the strict city campaign finance laws. Upwards of a million dollars, and possibly more, are involved, with over $1.7 million in matching funds comprised of taxpayer dollars already disbursed and more are potentially at stake.

There have long been assumptions and rumors of the collaboration between the Working Families Party (WFP) and its favored candidates, but never before has the scope of or intricate processes behind its joint activity been exposed to the degree made possible by an extensive review of public documents and close to 50 interviews with a range of key players conducted by City Hall over the last few days.

Similarly, though the existence of Data and Field Services (DFS), a for-profit company incorporated in February 2007, had been mentioned in passing in prior press reports and as an ambiguous line on a dozen campaign finance reports over the last year and a half, never before have the details of the company and the extent of its ties to the Working Families Party been revealed.

And here's the follow up:

Just days after City Hall published a report examining the work done on their campaigns’ behalf by the Working Families Party and its secretive for-profit company, seven Council candidates and public advocate candidate Bill de Blasio filed reports showing an additional $114,178.76 paid to Data and Field Services (DFS). Together, that brings the total to $154,033.76 reported in payments so far to the company that shares staff, office space and resources with the Working Families Party (WFP).

In other words, 74 percent of the total money sent to DFS so far was reported in the week after the initial article appeared on www.cityhallnews.com. Those filings were to reflect a time period which ended on Aug. 10, the day the article appeared, but were not due in to the Campaign Finance Board (CFB) until Friday, Aug. 14.

Many of the recent charges stand in direct contradiction to what campaign managers and spokespeople were saying said about DFS work for the campaign just one week ago.