Halloran Owes NYS Fines for 2009 Council Run: Board of Elections

UPDATE, 9:20 a.m. Wed.: Councilman Dan Halloran released a statement on the filings Tuesday:

"The state filings which were the subject of the story, are merely post-election update notices while the campaign account remains open. The only reason it remains open is to pay out the vendor bills from the bonus that is owed the Halloran campaign from the NYC Campaign Finance Board.

As the state filings show, the only significant activity of the camp is retiring debt, which in large part must wait for the CFB’s disbursement. All filings with the State Board of Elections and City CFB are complete, current and available online."

The state’s Board of Elections has notified the Albany district attorney’s office that Councilman Dan Halloran, R-Whitestone, has missed five filing deadlines for his 2009 City Council run, a spokesman for the state's Board of Elections said.

The councilman, who is running for Congress against state Assemblywoman Grace Meng, D-Flushing, is two-and-a-half years in arrears on filing campaign finance reports for his Council bid, Board of Elections spokesmand Thomas Connolly said. As a result, the Board of Elections has sent the matter to Albany District Attorney P. David Soares for investigation.

A spokesman for Halloran said the councilman was not commenting on the matter at this time. But Halloran told the New York Post that he has taken all the necessary campaign finance actions on his 2009 campaign.

Austin Finan, a spokesman for Meng, said he expected Soares to follow through with criminal charges.

“Dan Halloran’s arrogance is dumbfounding,” Finan said. “[His] failure to file on five separate occasions suggests he is either wholly incompetent, supremely arrogant or desperately attempting to hide fundraising improprieties. Transparency is the cornerstone of our democracy and the taxpayers who fund New York’s campaign finance system deserve to know the truth.”

Connolly said the five missed deadlines dated back to January 2010. Election regulators have issued default judgments against the councilman for each absent filing.

After a year, these judgments become subject to possible criminal penalties. Halloran owes the state a total $3,243 in fines plus interest, Connolly said.

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