By Sarah Marshall
Today I look at the 8th-day-preceding reports of the two ballot questions committee, Vote No – Start Over Smart, and Vote Yes for Our Library. Unlike for PACs or candidate committees, there is no limit to the amount of money that can be given to a ballot question committee. As in previous summaries, multiple contributions from the same individual in a calendar year are combined. Individuals contributing no more than $50 do not need to be identified.
Vote No – Start Over Smart
- Money on hand as of January 1: $0
- Total receipts through October 15: $4,740
- # of donors: at least 35
- # of donations $50 or less: at least 16
- # of donations more than $50-$100: 9
- # of donations more than $100-$500: 10
- # of donations more than $500: 0
- # of $500 donations: 3
- In-kind donations received: $0
- Expenses: $1,564.79
- Liabilities: $0
Vote Yes for Our Library
- Money on hand as of January 1: $0
- Total receipts through October 15: $12,385
- # of donors: at least 103
- # of donations $50 or less: at least 42
- # of donations more than $50-$100: 27
- # of donations more than $100-$500: 34
- # of donations more than $500: 0
- # of $500 donations: 1
- In-kind donations received: $9.36
- Expenses: $7,537.56
- Liabilities: $0
First observation: Fewer people donated to the No campaign than to the Yes campaign, but potentially a larger percentage of its donors contributed $500 each. (Without knowing the precise number of total donors, this comparison cannot be conclusive.)
Second observation: In any campaign, expenditures are generally made for purposes such as postage, signs, printing, advertising, and website hosting. All of the Yes committee’s expenses and some of the No campaign’s expenses are for such items. However, the No committee reports additional expenses about which I am curious. I am the first to admit that I am no expert in campaign finance, so perhaps these expenses are completely legitimate, but why would a library ballot question committee have expenses for affidavit letters, moratorium letters, and Voter Veto letters? Perhaps the descriptions are insufficiently detailed, but none, on their face, seem to me relevant to the ballot question. Moreover, while those expenses are dated in September (the committee was organized on August 31), the only moratorium and Voter Veto efforts I know about occurred in the spring. I hope to learn more about these expenses.
THE AMHERST CURRENT 
Terry Johnson forwarded this statement from Christina Platt, treasurer of the Vote No committee: “No expenditures from any other source were rolled over into the “Vote No – Start Over Smart” campaign. That would be illegal! I mislabeled an expense and will amend the filing.”
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Dear Amherst Current,
This is your second story asking about “Where is the Big Money” in the present campaigning by the two Amherst PACs and the groups formed for and against the new library. One your first story, one person commented that there wasn’t much to see, and the financial disclosure forms show there isn’t much Big Money directly supporting the PACs. I agree, and thought the same about this story on the “Vote Yes” and “Vote No” committees. The data show that the Yes group raised 2.6 times as much as the No group over the reporting period and spent 4.8 times as much as the No group. Neither group had huge expenses or revenues.
This article asks about the legitimacy of some of the No group’s expenses. It’s an interesting question, but we’re also not talking about much money there either. Of the No group’s $1,564 in expenditures, $632 were for lawn signs and brochures, leaving just $933 remaining. I’m not an expert on campaign finances and the law of what are allowed expenses and what are not, but some of the questioned expenses – such as affidavits related to the citizen petition — seem related to the ballot question to me; maybe one of the No volunteers thought they were. And again, the expenses in question don’t amount to much, less than $1,000 total. I do wonder how much news/blog coverage this issue should have.
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Sarah, I assume you’ve seen the original email from Darcy Dumont? It was addressed to people who signed the moratorium petition. I wonder, also, if they rolled past expenses into this effort….
On Fri, Oct 29, 2021 at 2:01 PM THE AMHERST CURRENT wrote:
> The Amherst Current posted: ” By Sarah Marshall Today I look at the > 8th-day-preceding reports of the two ballot questions committee, Vote No – > Start Over Smart, and Vote Yes for Our Library. Unlike for PACs or > candidate committees, there is no limit to the amount of money that can” >
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