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Freund turns up as McQuinn’s top donor
A guest post by Deanna Lewis.
According to a recent review of the The Virginia Public Access Project, Margaret Freund, owner of Fulton Hill Properties, has been donating and raising a lot of cash for former 7th District Councilwoman and current State Delegate, Delores McQuinn.
Ms. Freund is listed as the ‘Top Donor’ for Delores McQuinn for 2009 to date with contributions totaling $3,373 raised at a January 8th 2009 fundraiser. The timing of this event is interesting. McQuinn had already risen to an uncontested seat on the House of Delegates in the January 6, 2009 SPECIAL election. While it is not uncommon for people to step up and contribute to pay for campaign debts after an election, the history of campaign contributions here needs to be examined.
A brief look at Ms. Freund’s and Fulton Hill Properties history of campaign contributions show that $5,373 was donated/raised over a period of 84 days for Delores McQuinn’s run for City Council and State Delegate seat. Ms. Freund’s only other political contributions listed on the VPAP website were to Tim Kaine’s run for Lt. Governor and Governor. Those donations spanned four years from 2001-2005 and were $973 less than what was given to the McQuinn campaigns.
At a time when Ms. Freund’s Oakwood Heights condominium project was under review by the Commission for Architectural Review (CAR), one could surmise that Delores McQuinn was becoming a very important Council Person to Ms. Freund in October 2008. It appears that the subsequent ruling of CAR to reject the Oakwood Heights plan and Ms. Freund’s appeal of CAR’s decision before City Council made Delores McQuinn even more important as a State Delegate in 2009.
State Delegate, Delores McQuinn did lobby City Council members on the developers behalf. Subsequently, City Council overturned CAR’s ruling on Oakwood Heights on February 23, 2009.
The newly appointed Interim City Council 7th District representative Betty Squire specifically cited a letter from Delegate McQuinn, saying that she “chooses to defer to [McQuinn]” when it was her time to rule on the appeal. Squire and other Council members said they voted for the development, in part, because it was endorsed by former Councilwoman Delores McQuinn. Does this chain of events ring as political pandering; satisfying the ignoble ambitions of one, over the protection of the historic fabric of the established Old & Historic areas of Richmond as a whole? You decide.
On Monday, June 15th, City Council’s decision will be challenged in Richmond Circuit Court. This Citizen is hopeful that the rule of law, blind justice if you will, overturns the decision made by City Council on February 23rd.
A guest post by Deanna Lewis. (Have something to share?)
“Does this chain of events ring as political pandering; satisfying the ignoble ambitions of one, over the protection of the historic fabric of the established Old & Historic areas of Richmond as a whole? You decide.”
Love that sentence!
Wow that is very shady. I look forward to hearing what the court decides. If I were Freund I would retreat with the small sliver of my remaining dignity. What does she imagine the possible positive outcome to be? Make some money and be damned with the consequences? Think McQuinn will always stick up for her? Eh, I doubt it.
so bribing your council person is definitely cheaper than hiring a lawyer…
Does anyone know how to file an ethics complaint against McQuinn? Shouldn’t this be investigated? Please tell me this is not kosher with the Virginia General Assembly.
Business as usual in Richmond, I’d have a little more respect for council members if they could at least hold out for a little more cash.
In Virginia, it is legal to serve on city council and act as paid a lobbyist for business in front of the council as long as the councilmember/lobbyist recuses his/herself from the vote.
And, it might still be legal to convert unsued campaign funds for personal use upon retirement from politics. So, a donation to someone running unopposed, as McQuinn was, would be in essance a personal payout.
So to make sure I have this straight, Ms. Freund made a public campaign contyribution to a candidate for the House of Delegates. The contribution was disclosed properly. This was somehow to influence the delegate on an issue before City Council, where the delegate has no vote. Well, she must have had an expectation of somerthing in exchange for her contribution. Many of us who contributed to Barack Obama last year had an expectation of something, also, so were we all guilty of federal electrion fraud, or the bribery statutes. And, no, it is not legal to convert campaign funds to a personal use.
You’re missing the crucial part where Squire deferred to McQuinn at the outset of the vote. And if you were there, you would’ve seen the JJ and crews theatrics. Where did all that come from?
Actually, “Ron,” the piece above states that the fundraising/contributions encompassed DMcQ’s last council race, too. Timing is everything.
Just to be clear, almost all of the City Council members who voted to overturn CAR’s decison on this issue cited Delores McQuinn’s support as the reason for their decision. In fact, she didn’t just passively support the project, she actively lobbied Council Members, whilst her son JJ and his friend went door to door in the North side of Church Hill gathering signatures in support of a “single family residential housing project”. Many the signatures came from people living in public housing projects, who no doubt are ill positioned to afford one of Freund’s luxury green condos.
Putting all of this together with Freund’s sudden enthusiastic support for McQuinn’s campaign leads me to conclude that at the very least, McQuinn had a ‘conflict of interest’ when she tricked impoverished Church Hill residents into supporting a luxury condo project and lobbied City Council on Freund’s behalf.
So I’m still unclear, and having a hard time finding answers through official channels, about what Delores’s constituents options are when it comes to holding her accountable for ethics violations.
Are there no formal channels by which these sorts of behaviors by elected officials are examined?
If so, this is a major roadblock to a functioning, representative democracy.
As I sit less than a mile from Patrick Henry’s famous “give me liberty or give me death” declaration, I cannot help but think this is absolutely not what our forebearers had in mind when they fought for independence from tryanny.
Apparently, the battle continues…..
Agree with everyone who has posted so far (except part of Ron’s post), I think this whole thing is pretty shady, but I have to side with Ron on one thing. It’s probably not illegal. And I agree with him, it IS illegal to turn campaign contributions into personal funds, but I don’t see that as the issue here (how would you prove it? McQuinn’s personal bank statements are just that, personal).
However, I don’t quite see what can be done – I really don’t think McQuinn’s violated anything. She even went to the trouble of reporting it. As I recall, there are no limits on Virginia campaign contributions – anyone here looked up that fact? If there are limits, this probably doesn’t violate them, even McQuinn isn’t stupid enough to report something like that.
I seem to recall that there is a moratorium on General Assembly members doing fundraising within a certain period of time when they meet, but that’s about it, and I’m not even sure of that. She wasn’t even in the assembly when these contributions were made. Again, the whole thing reeks, but I don’t have any suggestions about it, she did do the reporting as required by law.
If anyone has a suggestion for a valid way to report this as a violation of something, I’m eager to hear it. Otherwise…sorry folks, Richmond politics sucks, particularly in the East End…
The State of Virginia has NO contribution limits but all donations over $100 must be reported to the State Board of Elections.
McQuinn’s campaign donations were filed, just as they should be, hence the report on VPAP.
The VPAP web site states:
“The Virginia Public Access Project enhances disclosure and empowers visitors to draw their own conclusions”. VPAP compiles campaign/candidate contribution data and provides it to anyone with Internet access.
http://www.vpap.org/about_us/history
Kristen, accountability to constituents arrives across the board this November; an election that should not be overlooked. We will elect an official to a four year term in the 7th and a teo year term in the 70th with our vote, or with our apathy, in not turning out to vote.
We have the power to maintain accountability to that functioning, representative democracy that began here so long ago.
To split a small hair, in the Seventh, you will elect a council candidate to the remainder of a four-year term, not for the full four years.
Thanks for catching that, David. Split away… 🙂
I think the point missed is that it COULD have been illegal, and no-one would have known. By making a legal contribution, on the books, to the campaign committee, and having it properly reported, it became public…which was the honest thing to do. If either the donor or recipient were dishonest, then the transaction would have been off-book.
What did the court decide on June 15th?
Did not rule.
The process started on the 15th – a preliminary hearing.