Breed donation may be breach of finance law

A bundled contribution to London Breed’s mayoral campaign has raised questions about whether a lawyer and lobbyist for the shuttle company Chariot violated San Francisco’s campaign finance laws.

According to data from the San Francisco Ethics Commission dated April 30, the attorney, Nima Rahimi, collected $900 in donations for Breed’s campaign from nine people at a fundraiser. He also kicked in $250 himself.

Under Proposition T, a law passed by San Francisco voters in 2016, lobbyists are banned from making campaign contributions to elected officials at agencies they’re registered to lobby and to any candidates seeking election to those offices, according to LeeAnn Pelham, director of the city’s Ethics Commission. The law also bars lobbyists from making contributions collected from others, a practice known as “bundling.”

Rahimi is registered to lobby the Municipal Transportation Agency but not the Board of Supervisors or the mayor’s office. That means he’s only barred from making contributions or bundling donations for candidates or officeholders affiliated with the SFMTA. Other offices are fair game.

But a meeting between Rahimi and Supervisor Ahsha Safaí has created a potential problem. According to a Chariot spokeswoman, the two met to discuss the possibility of bringing “affordable first- and last-mile transportation options to underserved communities in District 11,” which Safaí represents.

“We’re always looking for opportunities to provide and expand transportation services in our district,” Safaí said. “I reached out to them and asked them to come talk to me about the services they provide and how we can put together a plan for District 11.”

The meeting was recorded by Chariot as a lobbying contact, which would render Rahimi ineligible to bundle donations on behalf of supervisors — like he did for the Breed campaign. Breed may be running for mayor, but she still represents District Five on the board.

But the Chariot spokeswoman said in an email that the meeting didn’t constitute a lobbying visit and that the company “corrected this error once it was brought to our attention.” Because Rahimi’s lobbying activity was only limited to interactions with the (SF) MTA, he “was permitted under local regulations to raise money for a member of the Board of Supervisors running for mayor.”

Pelham declined to comment on the specifics of anything that could come before the Ethics Commission, meaning she couldn’t weigh in on whether an infraction had occurred. Chariot declined to make Rahimi available for an interview. The donations were first reported by the San Francisco Examiner.

Tara Moriarty ,a spokeswoman from the Breed campaign, said the campaign will return the donations if it is determined they violated city laws.

“Ethics filings do not show any indication that Mr. Rahimi has ever lobbied the mayor or the Board of Supervisors, so he was free to contribute to the Breed campaign,” she said in an email.