Santa Fe residents trying to decide whether to vote for publicly funded city election campaigns might consider Albuquerque's experience.

Candidates for Albuquerque municipal offices last year were guinea pigs for a new voter-approved system of public campaign financing.

The main difference between what 69 percent of Albuquerque voters supported and the measure before Santa Fe's electorate on the March 4 municipal ballot is the level of detail.

Albuquerque officials spelled out in advance how much money candidates would get, what they would have to do to qualify and other specifics in an Open and Ethical Elections Code. Here, however, a proposed charter amendment would endorse the concept, but not a specific system.

If Santa Fe voters favor Amendment 4, they will order the City Council to develop a system to establish "meaningful public financing of campaigns" before May 2010, although the amendment doesn't specify the system must be up and running by that time.

"That was smart," said Albuquerque's acting city clerk, Randy Autio, who administered that city's October election. "I think our council had good intentions of putting this in the charter to make it permanent. But on the other hand, they did not allow the means to make small changes to it easily."

The system worked well, according to Autio, candidates involved and a community advocacy group. However, city staff, elected officials and others have recommended changes to improve the system.

"The main thing is that it was good that the first election it was used with was a council race," said Autio. "It's a dry run for the 2009 mayoral race. That gets more complicated because the number of signatures they will have to collect is a much larger number and there is also a larger disbursement amount."

While council candidates initially get about $27,000 each, based on the number of registered voters in their district, mayoral candidates will get $270,000 for citywide campaigns. The money comes from transferring one-tenth of 1 percent of the city's annual budget to an elections fund. Last year that amounted to about $480,000.

Of the nine candidates who competed for three Albuquerque City Council seats last year, five used public financing while the others raised money from private sources.

One publicly funded candidate is under investigation for alleged overspending, but everyone else appears to have complied with the rules, Autio said.

In another race, additional money was distributed to publicly financed candidate Debbie O'Malley after her opponent, Katherine Martinez, reported raising more money than O'Malley. O'Malley defeated Martinez, drawing 72 percent of the vote.

The timing of such secondary distributions of money to publicly funded campaigns is one of the shortcomings of the system, according to participants such as Rey Garduño, another city councilor who was elected last year.

The problem is that deadlines for filing campaign finance reports are just days before the election, he said. If a privately funded candidate reports he or she has spent more money than the publicly funded candidate received, the city makes up the difference. But if the higher spending is reported after the election or just days before it, public candidates might not have an opportunity to spend their additional allocations.

That scenario didn't play out, but it could in the future, said Garduño, winner in a field of four with 49 percent of the vote in his district. Two other publicly funded candidates and one who chose private financing also ran in his district. Before he ran for office, Garduño had advocated for the public-financing system with the organization Common Cause.

"I support it because ... no developer-driven, corporate-driven, money-driven, special-interest candidate can hold sway over someone else," he said.

More importantly, he said, he used the opportunity to knock on nearly 4,000 doors and talk to residents about their concerns, not to ask for donations.

Candidates seeking public campaign funds have to collect "qualifying" $5 donations from several thousand voters to prove the viability of their campaign, but that money goes straight to the city.

"Once we satisfied the qualification part of it, never again did I mention money to anyone," Garduño said. "Never again did I put money before the discussion of what it is that we need to do to make this a better community."

Common Cause issued a report after the election that provided a similar analysis, noting that incumbent Councilor Brad Winter opted not to use the system but said he favors keeping it in place.

Campaign spending has been on the rise in recent Santa Fe city elections. In 2002, winning incumbent Mayor Larry Delgado raised and spent about $96,000. In the 2006 mayoral election, in which three candidates spent a total of more than $355,000 campaigning for the $25,700-a-year part-time position, winner David Coss led the pack at $146,169.

City councilors last year approved putting the campaign-financing amendment on the ballot on the recommendation of a Charter Review Commission. The commission said such a system would eliminate the potential for corruption inherent in the current situation.

The commission stopped short of suggesting a specific financing system, however, because members realized the charter would be difficult to amend in a way that would allow adjustments. The panel also wanted elected officials, instead of appointed ones, to resolve key issues such as whether the system should involve full funding of campaigns, similar to Albuquerque's system, or partial funding, through matching of private donations. Other issues include how to defray the estimated $100,000 to $200,000 annual public cost of supporting campaigns. One idea on that issue is to impose a small property tax, but commission Chairman Jim Harrington said such a plan is unlikely.

Another issue is how to determine whether a candidate is qualified to receive taxpayer money. The requirement for the candidate to raise a series of small donations, used by Albuquerque and the campaign-financing rules for the state Public Regulation Commission candidates, is supposed to fix that. But critics say that isn't always enough to determine who is a serious candidate.

Contact Julie Ann Grimm at 986-3017 or jgrimm@sfnewmexican.com.

HOW ALBUQUERQUE'S SYSTEM WORKS

Candidates who voluntarily seek to wage publicly financed campaigns in Albuquerque municipal elections collect donations of $5 from 1 percent of registered voters within their council district (or citywide if running for mayor) payable to the city's Open and Ethical Elections Fund.

Candidates are allowed to spend "seed money" of no more than $100 each from individual contributors and $500 of his or her own money in the early stage of exploring a run for office, but use of that money is limited to collecting qualifying contributions. Seed money can't exceed 10 percent a campaign spending limit.

Once candidates are qualified to participate, the city clerk distributes an amount equal to $1 per registered voter in the candidate's district, minus the amount of any seed money. If a nonparticipating candidate in the same race reports using more money than that initial distribution to the publicly funded candidate, the city provides additional campaign funds to make up the difference. Unopposed candidates do not receive distributions.

All expenditures of public money and use of in-kind donations and seed money must be reported on four separate dates before the election and one week following the election.

Permissible expenses include salary to those providing services such as polling, consulting or advertising; admission to sporting events or other forms of entertainment for the purpose of conducting campaign activity; dues, fees or parking at a recreational facility for a fundraising event; minor costs such as clothing bearing a campaign message; campaign materials; communications systems; and campaign offices and associated fees for utilities or janitorial services.

The city devotes one-tenth of 1 percent of its annual budget to the elections fund. Last year that amounted to about $480,000. Five publicly financed candidates got between $23,000 and $30,000 each for Albuquerque's October election, depending on the population of their districts. Mayoral candidates in 2009 will get about $270,000 each.

VOTING INFORMATION

To vote early in-person for the municipal election, visit the city clerk's office on the second floor of City Hall, 102 Lincoln Ave. Office hours are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. Absentee voting ends Feb. 29. About 20 polling places will be open March 4 from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Voter registration closed earlier this month.

COMING SATURDAY

Who is in charge of enforcing campaign-finance rules in Santa Fe city elections? At least one member of a city board says it's not doing the job. Look for the story in tomorrow's New Mexican.