Leffingwell fixes $72,000 in campaign bookkeeping goofs

Discrepancies came from clerical flubs such as an incorrect home address.

Mayor Lee Leffingwell filed corrections Wednesday to his campaign-finance reports, stating that about $72,000 in discrepancies were caused by clerical errors and other oversights.

Leffingwell raised about $750,000 total in his campaigns in 2009 and 2012, and all of his contributions were reported in city disclosure forms, as required. The errors were mostly missing or incorrect expenditures, an incorrect address on a loan, and other mistakes.

Campaign staff members prepared the reports on Leffingwell’s behalf, according to the mayor’s chief of staff. In affidavits accompanying corrected forms filed with the city, Leffingwell’s campaign states the discrepancies were accidental.

For instance, a staff member thought that one section of a 2012 financial-disclosure form required the campaign to report spending from May 4 onward. The staff member there- fore omitted $32,000 in spending that happened on May 3 and was supposed to be included in the report, creating a mismatch between the amount raised and the amount spent.

Another example: In disclosing a $30,000 loan Leffingwell made to his campaign in 2012, the forms do not list the mayor’s home address, as is required. Instead they list the address of a donor, Thomas Coopwood. Leffingwell’s campaign said that error happened because a staff member incorrectly cut and pasted the wrong address.

The errors were reported this week by a nonprofit journalism website.

Ultimately, penalties could only happen if one of Leffingwell’s previous opponents were to sue him.

Buck Wood, an attorney who deals extensively with campaignfinance law, said mistakes like those on Leffingwell’s paperwork are common. Though they sometimes carry serious financial consequences, Wood said that the violations are often found to be incidental.