I’ve been up to my eyeballs investigating the Lieberman petty cash slush fund and it’s possible connections to street money. What I hadn’t been looking into was other improprieties connected to Lieberman’s get out the vote operation in the primary and since. Not surprisingly, though, the Lieberman campaign has been tied to GOTV activities that run afoul of the law. Daniel Goren’s Hartford Courant article on Prenzina Holloway and Urban Voters & Associates reveals a serious failure by Lieberman’s subcontractor. Holloway was banned from ballot distribution by the Connecticut State Elections Enforcement Commission for forging signatures on absentee ballots in the last election, yet was doing just that for Lieberman now.

While Holloway clearly acted in contravention to the SEEC punishment by distributing, the $17,550 handed over by the Lieberman campaign to Urban Voters & Associates reeks of street money. The company is not listed in any internet article I have found, other than in connection to this Courant piece and Lieberman’s October FEC filing. It is run by the daughter of a Hartford city councilwoman, that is, someone with political connections. It is operated out of a multi-family home and not an office. UV&A was hired to do local GOTV work, a job handled by many ringer consultants from DC and New Jersey in the primary.

The Lieberman campaign spent at least $133,340.00 on field consulting in the last three weeks of the primary with people ranging from his former presidential campaign staff (Chris Lavery) to former NJ governor James McGreevey’s deputy chief of staff (James Gee). It’s unclear what, exactly, Lieberman thought he was purchasing now from Urban Voters & Associates that he wasn’t getting from his bevy of campaign veterans.

[Lieberman campaign chief of staff Sherry] Brown said Urban Voters was hired to help with voter contacts in Hartford, including the distribution of absentee ballot applications.

She said she was under the impression that the company was run by Holloway’s daughter, city Councilwoman rJo Winch.

Brown knew Holloway had an elections enforcement issue, but she believed it had been settled. She said the Lieberman campaign did not, however, do any background checks on any company hired to do campaign work.

The most telling thing is that the Lieberman campaign didn’t ask any questions. Not asking questions about how a surrogate does their get out the vote work is a hallmark of street money deployment. Take a look at the following numbers from Lieberman’s October FEC filings:

7/20 - JEF Associates - Field Consulting - $20,000.00
7/28 - JEF Associates - Field Consulting - $18,000.00
8/4 - Chris Lavery (San Francisco) - Field Consulting - $4,520.00
8/4 - James Gee (Trenton) - Field Consulting - $7,000.00
8/4 - JEF Associates - Field Consulting - $19,000.00
8/4 - Tomas Reyes - Field Consulting Services - $8,250.00
8/11 - Daryl Brooks - Field Consulting Services - $12,200.00
8/11 - Stan Welch - Field Consulting - $10,200.00
8/15 - Chris Lavery - Field Consulting - $4,520.00
8/15 - Dan Robinett - Field Consulting Services - $3,000.00
8/15 - James Gee - Field Consulting Services - $7,000.00
8/15 - Mary Wagley - Field Consulting - $1,200.00
8/15 - Stan Welch - Field Consulting Services - $10,200.00
8/15 - Tomas Reyes - Field Consulting Services - $8,250.00

UV&A was paid over $17,500 - more than every consultant on this list, save JEF Associates. Their work is being done post-primary, but it’s an awful lot of money paid to what seems to be a novice company. Keep in mind that the people listed here are political operatives brought in from out of state to help Joe down the final stretch of the primary. UV&A was hired for their local outreach and paid handsomely for it.

How did Lieberman end up choosing to hire Urban Voters & Associates, a company run out of a home office, to the tune of $17,000. What tactics were deployed with this money? How many people are on UV&A staff working for Lieberman? Does UV&A keep time sheets, invoices, and expense reports - can they prove that they spent all of this money on services rendered and that it was not passed along as street money to buy votes? Most importantly, did the Lieberman campaign hire Urban Voters & Associates with the understanding that in addition to distributing ballots, they distribute money to voters?

Yesterday the Public Campaign Action Fund wrote this in regards to Lieberman’s $387,000 petty cash slush fund:

Yet we believe that this issue, if left unresolved, will not simply impact this election, but also elections to come. No other Senate campaign that we know of has ever left undisclosed to the public a sum as large as this.

The impact is clear. Joe Lieberman’s campaign expenditures must be questioned and cannot be taken at face value. Legally dubious subcontractors and massive amounts of unaccounted petty cash arise from the same disrespect for campaign finance propriety. That may be the extent of their connection, but we cannot know without full disclosure from the Lieberman campaign and their subcontractor Urban Voters & Associates.