Defenders of clean elections -- WHAT: Stop a raid on the public campaign financing fund! WHEN: This Tuesday morning, the 24th, 8:30AM sharp WHERE: Room 416, City Hall PLEASE RSVP: We'll need lots of people there Even as we get traction in our efforts to help pass a federal public campaign funding bill, our public funding system in San Francisco is under threat. Last year, Mayor Newsom, who has not supported our efforts to bring cleanly financed elections to San Francisco, tried to raid the public campaign financing fund. Back then, there was no budget shortfall, and so a program was created, "SF Promise," whose funding it was said, would be taken from the public financing fund. Even though the cost of this program was only $525,000 in the first year, the Mayor proposed removing $6 million from the public financing fund for it. You can read these numbers in their own press release <http://www.sfgov.org/site/mayor_index.asp?id=67895>. But with the help of Supervisor Peskin, we funded SF Promise from the general fund reserve, and the plan was defeated. But, now that we have a budget shortfall, they're back again. *While most programs are being cut between 5% - 20%, the Mayor is proposing a 300% cut to the public financing fund* -- not just cutting our annual allocation, but actually removing 2 years of allocations out of the fund in one fell swoop. The fund, which now covers both mayoral and supervisorial elections, would be reduced in size from $9.3M to $4.3M. According to the Director of Ethics Commission, just to meet the minimum baseline funding for the next mayoral race would require no fund raids after this year, continued baseline funding, AND will probably require a supplemental appropriation. The Ethics Commission has called a special meeting to consider whether to give their blessing to this plan this Tuesday morning at 8:30am, and we need the help of all of you, to soundly defeat this proposal. This one is going to be difficult, truly, so please make it. Our most friendly commissioner is on vacation, and the mayor's appointee will probably be against us, leaving 3 votes up for grabs. We need a majority to take the wind out of the sails of this plan. A special meeting was called for this item, so it will be the only thing on the agenda, meaning it shouldn't take a huge amount of your time. Can you make it? This is an important one. Please RSVP and let me know. Otherwise, I'll have to spend all day phone banking on Monday : ) Rob Arnow San Franciscans for Voter Owned Elections www.voterownedelections.org 415-552-2229