In the first meeting of its kind, the Clean Elections Review Board convened Wednesday night to consider if at-large City Council candidate Brandon Mazer will qualify as a clean elections candidate.
A few weeks ago, allegations emerged that Mazer had accepted an illicit donation in the form of polling data before registering for the program, which would disqualify him from receiving clean elections funds.
The poll, which circulated this spring, asked Portland residents for their opinions on various city politicians including City Manager Danielle West, Mayor Mark Dion and several sitting city councilors. Only two people were mentioned in the poll who were not current elected politicians in the city: Brandon Mazer and Joey Brunelle. Brunelle was a declared council candidate but ultimately withdrew his candidacy.
Mazer currently chairs the Planning Board and ran for City Council in 2021.
Austin Sims, a former school board candidate, brought a complaint against Mazer about six weeks ago, saying Mazer had knowledge of the poll and ultimately received polling data before announcing his City Council campaign. If true, that would be a violation of the clean elections rules that bar in-kind donations exceeding $100 in value from companies or groups. Clean elections candidates are only allowed to accept small monetary donations from individual people.
The Clean Elections Review Board consists of three people: Phil Steele, Peter Goldman and Maria Maffucci. Only Goldman was present in person on Wednesday night. Steele was present via Zoom, apparently traveling via car.
The public hearing kicked off with Sims, who explained his allegations.
“I have no personal connection to Mr. Mazer,” Sims said. “But he is known to have close connections to the Chamber of Commerce.”
There was debate throughout the evening about who circulated the poll. Sims submitted screenshots of the data, which attributed it to the Moore Information Group.
According to April 2024 financial disclosures of the Enough Is Enough political action committee, the group received a $10,000 donation from the Portland Regional Chamber of Commerce in March. That same month, they paid the Moore Information Group $19,000.
“Donation happened, ten days later, survey went out, nine days later Enough is Enough paid Moore Information Group,” Sims said.
Another company, Cornerstone, has sent a letter to the city claiming responsibility for the poll, but Sims is adamant that Moore conducted the poll.
During his testimony, Mazer repeatedly said he had no knowledge of the poll.
The city clerk’s office conducted an investigation into the allegations earlier this month and concluded Mazer did not act improperly.
“We have found that Brandon has not received any data or other in-kind contributions regarding this survey,” City Clerk Ashley Rand said in an email.
Joey Brunelle spoke during public comment, backing Sims’ allegations that Mazer had worked with the chamber on the poll.
“I put out a call to everyone that I knew in the Portland political scene and the information came back to me that Brandon was in the process of deciding whether or not to run and was trying to decide whether to do so with the help of…The Chamber of Commerce,” he said.
Mazer urged the board to make a decision quickly. Clean elections funds will begin being distributed on July 15.
Ultimately, Goldman and Steele engaged in brief deliberations and tentatively determined Mazer had done nothing wrong.
“Mr. Sims, I don’t believe you have carried your burden and consequently I believe the appeal should be denied,” Goldman said.
“I would concur with that,” Steele said. “But I do think as a personal opinion … it is curious that poll included questions about Mr. Mazer, and I can understand completely Mr. Sims’ concern about that. And the burden that we apparently are asking him to produce is a heavy one.”
The board will continue deliberations on July 24 at 11 a.m. to reach a final decision. In the meantime, they agreed that Mazer will be allowed to accept clean elections funds on July 15. However, should the board change their minds and decide he is ineligible for the program, he will have to return the funds.
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