By ALEX GIMARC
Earlier this year, I filed an APOC complaint against Mayor Suzanne LaFrance, which was served to LaFrance on Sept. 24. I have now filed a second campaign finance reporting complaint based on the 2024 Mayoral election campaign. This one was based on mayoral candidate Bill Popp. APOC accepted the complaint and served notice to Mr. Popp on Oct 8. Complaint 25-24-CD is not yet available on APOC’s web site, though all his campaign finance reports are available for public viewing. Mr. Popp has until Oct 23 to respond.
Analysis of his reports identified at least 31 non-compliance instances. Most of them fail to discreetly disclose each contractor or subcontractor engaged in creating a product. Essentially, he bundled payments which hides spending details from Anchorage voters.
Popp used two local media companies for his campaign advertising. He appears to have bundled four payments for at least 14 discrete services. If APOC’s investigation finds more than 14, the count of violations will grow. APOC dealt with several digital advertising cases recently.
One example of a violation is documented in the Thirty Day Report, Feb 2024, where he bundled $7,000 of expenditures for Alpha Media and CTV. A second example is Popp bundled $18,000 of media purchases for TV and radio into four lump sums. State law requires each media placement to be reported discreetly. There are another 13 possible violations here.
One oddity in his reporting is that the 105 Day Report appears to be adequate and compliant. Other reports, not so much.
All told, we believe that there are at least 31 potential violations. At $50/day for 530 days, this would suggest a possible fine of over $800,000 for the campaign.
In closing, we are back to the notion that nobody is above the law. We are about to find out if Mr. Popp and his campaign are above the law or required to comply just like every other candidate running for office here in Alaska. We are going to find out how well APOC enforces violations of state law. While I hope for the best, I am ready for anything.
Alex Gimarc lives in Anchorage since retiring from the military in 1997. His interests include science and technology, environment, energy, economics, military affairs, fishing and disabilities policies. His weekly column “Interesting Items” is a summary of news stories with substantive Alaska-themed topics. He was a small business owner and Information Technology professional.
Hell yah. Great job thank you for your investigative reporting and submitting these errors into APOC
Bill Popp is now on the Chugach Board’s charitable giving program. This is where Chugach rounds up your bill and aggregates the money so they can donate to their backers like REAP and the Alaska Center for the Environment. Sickening.
That isn’t how APOC fines work.
Yes … but … however … Bill Popp sidled up to Suzanne LaFrance immediately after it was clear he had no chance of being the next mayor. Now has an important job with a high salary in her administration. The chances are good that her minions will protect him and all of this will “go silently into that good night”. LaFrance has excused his recent major screw-ups so she will overlook this, too. We know by now that LaFrance protects those who support her and the rest of us who do not have no hope for any justice or equity that should come with our residency in the Muni. She and her chief of staff will not publish their email addresses and declines requested appointments or any of her time when such requests come from those she evaluates an unimportant to her. Her message to regular folks is loud and clear: “Get Lost”.
Corruption, or just incompetence from top to bottom