Public campaigns serve the public
   Make no mistake about it. The businesses that are pushing for an initiative on Portland’s voter-owned elections system approved by the City Council last spring aren’t worried about funding city services like police and schools — they’re scared for themselves, plain and simple (Campaign reform gets PR machines rolling, Aug. 23).
   These real estate, travel industry and utility companies are frightened that now that candidates will have the option to run with public funding, they will not have the influence in City Hall that they have enjoyed as major contributors to citywide campaigns. After all, these companies contributed more than $100,000 to Portland political campaigns in 2004 alone.
   Under voter-owned elections, Portland politicians will be accountable to voters, not these special-interest donors.
   John C. Elder
   Southeast Portland
   
   Public-financing foes have clear motives
   You used a stunning double standard when citing a former lobbyist for AT&T, a corporation with headquarters in New York City, to frame the debate against public financing of Portland elections in the same article in which you attempted to discredit the Money in Politics Research Action Project for receiving grant funding from out of state (Campaign reform gets PR machines rolling, Aug. 23). However, this is typical of the hysterical anti-public financing coverage of this paper.
   Of course, you don’t apply that reasoning to corporations such as Intel, U.S. Bank, Portland General Electric or the hundreds of other corporations headquartered outside of Oregon. I guess you only object to out-of-state money that represents regular folks.
   Let’s be honest about the reasons the coalition is fighting public financing. They benefit from access and don’t want to give up their political advantage. They like the pay-to-play system and want to keep it that way since they can afford to pay. As Commissioner Sam Adams put it in the hearing on public financing, “Just one unnecessary tax abatement” would pay for the voter-owned financing system. But as recipients of many of the unnecessary tax abatements, developers and others in the coalition hide behind the very real budget shortfalls to obscure their desire to raid the treasury themselves.
   Please don’t allow these reverse-Robin Hoods to pretend to care about school funding or social services. They are too late to that issue to have any credibility.
   RuthAlice Anderson
   Northeast Portland
   
   Watchdog donors are open about interests
   It is true that much of the small yearly budget — $90,000 — of the Money in Politics Research Action Project, which advocates for campaign finance reform and tracks money in Oregon politics, comes from foundations, some of them from out of state (Campaign reform gets PR machines rolling, Aug. 23).
   Keep in mind that the foundations say what they are and what they want: organizations promoting campaign finance reform efforts around the nation. Public financing of elections, like our voter-owned elections ordinance, makes elections accountable to voters, not special-interest donors.
   In contrast, the big money donors who are lining up to eliminate voter-owned elections not only have access to far more cash, but are disingenuous about their motivations. They are fighting the new system because they are afraid of losing their influence in City Hall.
   Janice Thompson
   Executive director
   Money in Politics Research Action Project
   Southwest Portland