San Diego officials look to unmask spending that influences city business

San Diego officials will consider strengthening disclosure requirements for lobbyists who spend money to influence local government.

A San Diego City Council committee voted unanimously Wednesday morning to start working on a “follow the money ordinance,” which would ban contributions from registered lobbyists and require real-time disclosure of money spent to influence city business. The proposal needs two votes from the full City Council as well as the mayor’s signature to take effect.

Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera, who brought the proposal forward, said money in politics has eroded public trust for decades and it’s only getting worse.

“The problem isn’t the people in this room,” Elo-Rivera said, referring to his council colleagues. “It’s that the most consequential spending to influence what happens in this room takes place in ways the public can’t see, and when that happens, the effect isn’t abstract. There are people who are negatively impacted by that.”

The city requires a lobbyist who spends at least $5,000 to file disclosures every three months. The proposal would lower that threshold to $1,000, require them to register with the city and vastly narrow the disclosure window to 24 hours. If approved, elected officials and candidates would be prohibited from accepting campaign contributions from registered lobbyists. It would also require:

• A copy of all public communication filed with the City Clerk.
• Disclosure of top five funders on all public communications.
• Disclosure of AI-generated or AI-altered content.

Lobbyists are spending millions of dollars to sway decisions with no disclosure until long after the vote, treating city business like electoral campaigns, said Rosa Olascoaga, deputy chief of strategic initiatives for Elo-Rivera. And right now, lobbyists are playing both sides of the field by funding the campaigns of the very people they plan to lobby. 

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Councilmember Joe LaCava, serving as chair of the committee, pointed out that special interest groups are sending out mailers and text messages with misleading information and no accountability.

“The voters may or may not agree with actions that we put forth as council,” LaCava said, “but at least they will be well-informed about who is trying to influence them.”

Councilmember Raul Campillo called the proposal a necessary step forward. But he urged officials to take it further by amending a definition to capture more groups or companies that reach out to councilmembers to influence their decisions.

Elo-Rivera’s proposal comes only weeks after the defeat of Measure A — another proposal he championed that called for an $8,000 tax on second and third homes left vacant for most of the year. Opponents outspent supporters by a factor of 9 to 1 to kill the proposal, according to the last expenditure filing. At least one of the ads put out by the No campaign featured a false claim, as inewsource previously reported.

An earlier version of the measure included a tax on full-time vacation rentals, which was torpedoed in January after hours of heated public debate — fueled at least in part by paid protesters from Los Angeles who were bused into town to oppose the measure, according to reporting by Voice of San Diego.

Elo-Rivera said he’d like to eventually extend this same proposal to campaign committees.