4:24 pm Jun. 21, 2012
City Councilman Leroy Comrie's campaign was fined $16,272 by city officials, in part because the two-term Democrat from Queens failed to file some paperwork with the New York City Campaign Finance Board.
The C.F.B. fined Comrie for spending more then $33,000 in excess of the $161,000 limit in his 2009 re-election race. Comrie said $56,179 of his expenditures shouldn't have counted toward the limit because the money was used when he was running for borough president, where the spending and donations limits are higher. But Comrie dropped out of that race after term limits were extended in late 2008, and did not officially notify the C.F.B. of his decision to switch races by the January 15, 2009 deadline. (In exchange for not having the spending count toward his cap, Comrie would also have had to "freeze" his account and not use the money he had already raised.)
Also part of Comrie's fine was a $3,750 penalty for allegedly coordinating with unions and not properly recording their help as an in-kind contribution.
C.F.B. inspectors visited his campaign office and, according to a report today, "observed coordinated get-out-the-vote activities among union groups and Campaign staff."
The two groups collaborated on phone-banking and literature distribution, according to the C.F.B.
