Campaign finance reports coming quicker and cleaner, electronically

More and more city candidates and political committees are submitting their campaign finance reports electronically so they can be more easily viewed by the public. They are also handing in reports with less missing data than they were before.

Such are the highlights of a cursory review by the Philadelphia Board of Ethics of the last three campaign reporting cycles, in which electronic filings were required by city law for the first time.

The online reports are maintained by the city Records Department (http://www.phila.gov/records/), which provides a searchable, if still rough, database of campaign donors.

Of the 192 reports due June 14, the latest reporting deadline, more than 90 percent were filed on time. By contrast, just 60 percent of the total reports filed in the previous cycle were submitted on time.

The progress was hailed yesterday at a monthly meeting of the ethics board, which is still in its first year as an entity independent of any other, with a $1 million budget.

The five-member board welcomed its newest member, Phoebe Haddon, appointed to fill the remaining three-year term of the Rev. Alyn E. Waller, who resigned in March.

The board also reported that, as required under its governing legislation, it has provided ethics training to all but 2,100 of 25,000 city employees. "No other municipal government has come close to training as many employees as we have," said Shane Creamer, the board's interim executive director.

The board's New York City counterpart, where ethics training is voluntary, has trained 11,000 employees, Creamer said.

Currently, the Philadelphia board is also compiling an ethics manual to serve as a guide to businesses that work or seek work with the city government.