Our Philadelphia

Representative, District 182

Josephs's Top Donors, 2001-2008

1	LAWPAC	$26,000
2	Committee For A Better Tomorrow	$15,000
3	Pennsylvania Women's Campaign Fund PAC	$7,500
4	Pennsylvania State Education Association	$7,000
5	Philadelphia Federation of Teachers	$5,800

About Josephs's Top Donors

LAWPAC

LAWPAC is the PAC of the Pennsylvania Trial Lawyers’ Association. LAWPAC gave $3.7 million to Pennsylvania candidate from 2001-2008, and many of those giving to LAWPAC were trial lawyers opposed to limits on the right to sue. In a 9/30/01 Inquirer article, the Trial Lawyers’ lobbyist Mark Phenecie claimed that LAWPAC didn’t give to judicial candidates because, "We don't want to look like we are trying to influence a judicial election." Yet when a judicial candidate backed by State Sen. Vince Fumo was running for Superior Court in 1999, LAWPAC shipped a $29,000 contribution to Fumo's Committee for a Democratic Majority on Oct. 19. Then on Oct. 22, the Committee for a Democratic Majority shipped a $30,000 contribution to Schiller's campaign. Tracking these kinds of indirect contributions is especially difficult because contributions made in non-election years often don’t have to be disclosed until February of the following year, under Pennsylvania law. Discovering the Trial Lawyer’s entire legislative agenda, beyond defeating limits on lawsuits, is also difficult because Pennsylvania does not require lobbyists to disclose the exact number of the bills on which they have been lobbying.

Committee For A Better Tomorrow

The Committee For A Better Tomorrow is the PAC for the Philadelphia Trial Lawyers Association. After learning that this PAC had given $1 million to State Supreme Court candidate Jack Panella (D) for his 2009 campaign, Panella’s opponent, Republican Jane Orie Melvin, criticized Panella for engaging in “pay to play” politics. In a 10/27/09 interview with WHYY radio, Orie Melvin also said that justices should recuse themselves from cases involving major campaign contributors. Yet Orie Melvin received at least $125,000 from the Committee For A Better Tomorrow for her own campaign. One way for Pennsylvania to get its judges out of the business of ruling on cases involving campaign contributors would be to establish a system of merit selection. It’s bad enough that major campaign contributors enjoy special access to members of our state legislature. But what recourse does the average citizen who can’t afford to write four- and five-figure checks to political candidates have if their legislature and judiciary are both beholden to their top contributors? For example, a 2009 study by Common Cause/Pennsylvania found that 3 of the top 21 recipients of campaign contributions from casinos from 2001-2008 were state supreme court justices.

Pennsylvania Women's Campaign Fund PAC

http://www.pwcf.com/

Pennsylvania State Education Association

According to its website, “PSEA includes 1,199 local associations, representing teachers, education support professionals, health care professionals, higher education professionals, retired educators and students. We represent teachers in 483 of Pennsylvania’s 501 school districts.” PSEA’s legislative agenda in Harrisburg includes boosting teacher salaries and reserves in their pension fund, boosting school funding, providing for cost-of-living adjustments for PSEA member salaries, expanding opportunities for early retirement, and opposition to a bill that would curtail teachers’ rights to strike. Recent legislation to limit teacher strikes was introduced by State Sen. Robert Mellow after teachers at a school in Lackawanna County struck 4 times in 18 months. If Mellow's bill becomes law, no contract dispute would last into the school year. By the end of summer, teachers and school boards in conflict over contracts would present their cases to a team of arbitrators, who would decide which side's proposal was most fair. The panel's decision would be binding.

Philadelphia Federation of Teachers

http://www.pft.org