District Attorney John Sarsfield said Friday his office is in
the preliminary stages of investigating allegations that District 5
County Supervisor Jaime De La Cruz violated the county’s new
campaign finance laws with a letter and survey he recently sent to
constituents on stationary bearing the county seal.
Hollister – District Attorney John Sarsfield said Friday his office is in the preliminary stages of investigating allegations that District 5 County Supervisor Jaime De La Cruz violated the county’s new campaign finance laws with a letter and survey he recently sent to constituents on stationary bearing the county seal.
De La Cruz said he paid for the letter using money from his own pocket in addition to funds from an organization of which he is the sole member, and which he said received Fair Political Practices Commission recognition a few weeks ago. And while De La Cruz got the go-ahead from Board of Supervisors Chairman Reb Monaco and Deputy County Counsel Darren Bogie before using county
letterhead, Sarsfield said his office is beginning to look into the legality of other aspects of the letter.
“There’s a restriction on how much you can take under the local campaign finance laws, and I believe it’s no more than $250,” said Sarsfield.
At 37 cents a stamp, 1,200 mailers would cost $444 in addition to photocopying costs.
De La Cruz’ Campaign Manager Ignacio Velazquez said he did not know how much money had come from De La Cruz’ organization, Housing Opportunity Project Employment (HOPE), and how much had come out of De La Cruz’ pocket, but laughed when he heard Sarsfield was looking into campaign finance law violation charges.
“Why doesn’t he go out and investigate the actions of the supervisors and what they did to Jaime?,” he said.
The two-page mailer included a letter stating the slew of misconduct charges against De La Cruz were “false and were simply politically motivated by four former incumbents to steel [sic] the election” and a seven-question survey on issues like the proposed Miwok casino near Hollister, the job and housing markets and the creation of a homeless shelter.
Sarsfield said Friday if investigations show De La Cruz did break campaign finance laws with this letter, and if they prove to be criminal violations, he would be in violation of his probation for obstructing a police officer. As part of a plea bargain Sarsfield offered the supervisor in lieu of prosecuting for four felony and three misdemeanor charges related to accusations of elections fraud, De La Cruz plead no contest in January to misdemeanor obstructing or delaying a police officer.
Sarsfield and De La Cruz have clashed continually since the district attorney subpoenaed 30 witnesses for a grand jury investigation of the last year’s election, in which De La Cruz beat incumbent Bob Cruz by 10 votes amid charges of election fraud.
The district attorney said Friday there was some evidence De La Cruz is heading another committee at the same time as HOPE, which would also be a violation of the campaign finance law, though he did not know the name of the second organization.
“Again, this is all very preliminary,” he said.
Members of a committee to recall De La Cruz have also added the letter to their arsenal of accusations against the embattled supervisor.
“He used county stationary for what we consider a political letter,” said recall Spokesman Ruben Lopez, who was also the campaign manager for Cruz when he ran against De La Cruz. “It’s idiotic. He’s a college graduate, he should know better. He’s using the county logo as if this was an official letter from the county, it makes him look so officious. And then he tries to cover it up with that little survey.”
While the letter was printed on letterhead bearing the blue seal of San Benito County, both De La Cruz and Velazquez say the cost of printing and mailing came directly out of De La Cruz’ pocket. In fact, they said, De La Cruz had used only one sheet of actual county letterhead, color photocopying the rest of the 1,200 letters on his own dime.
On the recently revamped De La Cruz recall Web site, where the letter but not the survey is posted, the committee also points out a disclaimer at the bottom of the De La Cruz letter reading “Paid by HOPE (Housing Opportunity Project Education) FPPC# pending.” The committee also questions the legitimacy of accepting a donation from an organization to fund such a letter, writing “We believe a law was enacted last year limiting such contributions. If this letter is not a political ‘contribution’ and simply a gift, similar laws prohibit receiving gifts in excess of amounts of roughly $350.00 per year.”
De La Cruz noted earlier this week HOPE is an organization he founded to research job and housing needs in San Benito County, and said that was what he was trying to accomplish with his letter and survey from the beginning.
“HOPE is a committee I created seeking an FPPC# to educate my constituency,” De La Cruz said Friday. “It’ s a one-man committee. I funded the entire mailing because I feel I have an obligation to inform my constituency as to what’s going on in the county.”
Lopez said he still wasn’t convinced.
“Why didn’t he use HOPE stationary then?” he asked. “He should have had a HOPE stationary printed. If he had done that, then fine.”
De La Cruz dismissed these accusations, saying he asked both Deputy County Counsel Bogie and Monaco if he could use the county seal before writing the letter, which Velazquez said was about a month and a half ago.
“He talked to me about it before and he was going to do it at his own expense,” Monaco confirmed. “He talked to county counsel and they saw no problem with it, and I saw no problem with it.”
Jessica Quandt covers politics for the Free Lance. Reach her at 831-637-5566 ext. 330 or at jq*****@fr***********.com.
