Follow the Money

Fairfield Daily Republic

November 03, 2011 |
Follow the money
By Kelvin Wade

The Fair Political Practices Commission sent a letter last week revealing that it was Jake Pauline of Black Diamond Electric who spent $21,169 with Benicia-based Bellaci Designs to mail out last-minute hit pieces on Fairfield City Council candidates Teresa Courtemanche, Pam Bertani and Jamie Johnson before the 2009 election.

Suspicion fell on Councilwoman Catherine Moy because she used Bellaci Designs to send out campaign mailers and one of the mailers sported her campaign’s colors. Moy has steadfastly denied being involved.

So, why would an Antioch-based businessman donate $500 to Catherine Moy’s campaign and spend more than $20,000 on mailers trying to influence an election in Fairfield?

Who is Black Diamond Electric? Minimal digging finds that they used to be located in Pittsburg and are now in Antioch. And it turns out Black Diamond Electric has a history of donating to candidates and causes.

In 2006, Black Diamond Electric donated $5,000 to the Pittsburg City Council candidacy of a Salvatore Evola. Evola is a vice president at Discovery Homes and first cousin of Albert Seeno III, president of the Albert D. Seeno Construction Company and Discovery Homes. Evola has since become mayor of Pittsburg.

A March 2007 story on Thepress.net shows Seeno Homes collected a donation from Black Diamond Electric for a food bank drive in Contra Costa County.

November 2007 saw something similar to what happened in the Fairfield race happen in the Benicia mayoral race. A last-minute hit piece was mailed out, attacking Benicia mayoral candidate Elizabeth Patterson. One of the four contributors behind that mailing was Black Diamond Electric. The other three were developer-related businesses.

The big issue during that race was a proposed business park to be built by the Albert D. Seeno Construction Company. Patterson opposed the project unless changes could be made so the park fell in line with Benicia’s General Plan.

Now I haven’t seen anything that shows Black Diamond Electric working for the city of Fairfield but it does have these past ties to the Albert D. Seeno Construction Company. Seeno has had development agreements with Fairfield, including one approved this past summer by the City Council.

Now none of this shows any wrongdoing. I’ve seen nothing that shows Jake Pauline or Black Diamond Electric is involved with Seeno in Fairfield or any other company in Fairfield. I’m not speculating. I’m dealing with facts.

Nor does this mean that Councilwoman Moy was behind the mailings. Firms, unions and individuals donate to candidates that share their interests. That’s politics.

The 2009 election was incredibly close. Catherine Moy defeated challenger Pam Bertani by 160 votes or .68 percent. It’s not inconceivable that a backer of Moy’s could panic at some polling and want to do something to help. I take Councilwoman Moy at her word that she didn’t know.

The real culprit of our elections is the system itself. Why do we allow a system where people can pour unlimited sums of money into a race and say anything they want? No laws were broken in the 2009 race.

While there’s no evidence of wrongdoing here, the true “crime” may be what’s legal in our political system. Peace.
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ADDITIONAL NOTES: Let me say at the outset that while I'm an opinion columnist and consider myself a keen observer, I'm not an investigative journalist. (I will spare you the office politics that prompted me to decide to do this.) I wanted to look into this and do it in a responsible way. I didn't approach it with an agenda. I wanted to look into why someone would get involved in a local race with such a large sum of money. It's not unique to Fairfield. Often monied interests pour their resources into campaigns for candidates and causes that advance their agenda.

I'm not going to speculate and jump to conclusions. I have to follow the evidence. And what I found was a company that gave and gave to various candidates and causes outside its community. But I didn't find any ties between Black Diamond Electric or Jake Pauline and any Fairfield City Council member. I didn't find any record of them doing work for the city. Like I wrote, they often gave in conjunction with the Albert D. Seeno Construction Company. i don't know what kind of relationship they have. It's clear they want to support pro-growth candidates and communities. And there's nothing illegal about that.

If a reporter cares to pick up the ball and run with it, they certainly can. There's a lot of interesting information out there about the Seeno Construction Company but I didn't include it because I didn't believe it to be relevant.

Our political system would benefit greatly by getting the big money out of it. Enabling companies to spend unlimited amounts of money to influence races is just wrong. Some things are legal but they're still wrong. 527 groups pour millions into Presidential and Congressional races. Now, companies are allowed to set up 501 nonprofit organizations that don't have to disclose their donors and can pour millions into our elections. This just isn't right.

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