S.F. 496 makes technical changes to campaign finance and public disclosure laws.

Article 1-Technical Changes

Section 1 expands the definition of "public official" to include House and Senate fiscal analysts. Current law already includes House and Senate legislative analysts and attorneys.

Section 2 strikes a references to individuals being guilty of a gross misdemeanor and replaces it with language that says a violation of the subdivision is a gross misdemeanor.

Section 3 allows the Board to impose late filing fees starting on the day after the due date. The late filing fee is increased to $25 per day, not to exceed $1,000.

Section 4 strikes a reference to individuals being guilty of a gross misdemeanor and replaces it with language that says a violation of the subdivision is a gross misdemeanor.

Section 5 clarifies that the reporting period for a campaign report is January 1 to December 31 of the reporting year.

Section 6 corrects an internal inconsistency in the grace periods granted after a report filing deadline.

Section 7 prohibits accepting contributions from an association not registered with the Board during a legislative session. The language referencing a dissolving principal campaign committee is removed, thus allowing a terminating committee to make contributions during the legislative session.

Section 8 extends the changes made in section 7 to the penalty provisions. The Board may bring an action to collect civil penalites; in current law, the Board is required to bring an action.

Section 9 creates a "state special elections campaign account" in the special revenue fund. The creation of this account means that funds for special election public subsidy payments are handled in the same way as other public subsidy payments. The term "fund" is stricken and replaced with "account" to use proper terminology.

Section 10 corrects a date that was not corrected when the primary election was moved to August. The requirement that a candidate must spend half of their general account public subsidy payments by a specific date is removed.

Section 11 says that money from the general fund for special election subsidy payments is transferred to the state special elections campaign account instead of to the Board.

Section 12 strikes a reference to individuals being guilty of a misdemeanor and replaces it with language that says a violation of the subdivision is a misdemeanor.

Article 2- Conforming changes

Sections 1 to 8 change the word "fund" to "account" to conform to changes made in Article 1.

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