Once again the Madison City Council has decided to look for a solution to a problem that does not exist.
Last week the council voted to establish a Blue Ribbon Committee of Clean Elections, which will investigate full public financing for city elections.
The clean government plan would provide municipal candidates with taxpayer dollars to fund their campaigns if the candidates can gather enough $5 and $10 donations. According to its supporters, public financing is an attempt to stop the influential power of money in citywide campaigns in Madison. City Council candidates would be eligible for $5,000 of public money while mayoral candidates could get a whopping $100,000 of public money to run their campaigns.
The idea is based off the success of other full public financing programs in such cities as Albuquerque, N.M. and Portland, Ore., and entire states such as Maine and Arizona.
Particularly in Maine and Arizona, public financing has opened up statewide offices to candidates of a wide variety of political perspectives who otherwise would not have been able to afford a run for public office.
But in Madison, it still does not cost that much to run for municipal offices, and City Council candidates in the past with little funding but strong grass roots organizations have be able to defeat candidates with much larger war chests.
Furthermore, the Internet is making public office more accessible than ever. Candidates from Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, to Eli Judge and Lauren Woods (the two candidates for Madison's studentdominated 8th aldermanic district), have used the Internet to effectively convey their messages to voters at minimal cost.
This board would be more inclined to support full public financing of campaigns for state office. On the state level, politics has definitely become more expensive. Many in Wisconsin are justifiably concerned that the governor, for instance, has been unduly influenced by the money of Dennis Troha, a businessman who until recently was looking to operate a casino in Kenosha. Troha is currently being indicted for illegally funneling over $100,000 to Gov. Jim Doyle's campaign.
But Madison's policy would have no affect on the candidates running for state office. Madison's citywide ordinance will only affect the taxpayers of this city, not the statewide moneyed politicians at whom it is directed.
