Local officials spent thousands in campaign funds on restaurants and bars last year (pgh,pa.)
“Anytime I have meetings at night, I’m at Cappy’s [Cafe]. It’s the same bar that I have hung out [at] since 1989,” said Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto last week.
This likely comes as no surprise to anyone who has visited the Shadyside bar and has seen Mr. Peduto in his signature corner seat. The news is how he sometimes pays the tab: using his campaign donors’ dollars.
And he is not alone: Mr. Peduto was joined by Allegheny County Treasurer John Weinstein, County Controller Chelsa Wagner and City Council President Bruce Kraus in spending thousands of dollars from campaign accounts on meals last year, according to their annual disclosures filed last month.
According to Neil Makhija, an attorney who teaches campaign law at the University of Pennsylvania, and who ran unsuccessfully for state House as a Democrat in Carbon County in 2016, Pennsylvania campaign law says little about the appropriate uses of campaign money, other than that it can be spent "for the purpose of influencing the outcome of an election." The law also demands that candidates disclose "the purpose for which such expenditure was made."
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