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Cicero Booker is the poster child for the state's new campaign finance reform law designed to limit the influence of special interest money on state elections by providing state-funded grants.

Booker is one of the only minor party candidates whose campaign will be funded by the Citizens Election Program this year. Depending which side you're on, Booker's status proves the CEP is discriminatory toward third party candidates or it proves that it helps them.

In order to receive public grants, third party candidates must meet higher standards than Democrats and Republicans. To get the full grant, the candidate's party must have earned at least 10 percent of the vote for the same office in the prior election, or must collect petition signatures equal to 20 percent of those who voted last time. The candidate can get lesser grant amounts by collecting signatures equal to 10 or 15 percent of the vote.

That's unfair, says Booker, who's running for state Senate as an Independent in Waterbury. "To put all these hurdles in front of us, I believe it's to protect the majority parties," Booker says. "They're trying to make it difficult for the minor parties."

Booker had to collect 2,702 signatures to qualify for the $85,000 grant available to state Senate candidates, a burden not shared by the major parties. Republicans did not field a candidate in 33 state House and Senate seats in 2006. Imagine if they had to petition for funding in districts where they weren't on the ballot last time.

"The funding is equal but the hurdles are different," he says. In addition to gathering signatures, Booker had to raise $15,000. His opponents had to raise the same amount, but didn't need to go through the onerous task of petitioning.

The pro-labor Working Families Party, which is cross-endorsing Booker, had 30 canvassers to go door to door for three weeks to collect the signatures for Booker (they were paid for by Cicero for Senate).

"We think the thresholds could be more reasonable," says Working Families Party boss Jon Green. But, Green says, "It's an opportunity for minor party candidates to campaign with the resources that are commensurate with their major party opponents. Is the law perfect? No. Could it be better and more reasonable for minor parties? Yes. At the end of the day is it a better system, and does it create more opportunity? I think the answer is yes."

Beth Rotman, the director of the state's public financing program says the Citizens Election Program benefits minor parties, and she cites Cicero Booker as an example. Historically most minor parties weren't able to raise more than $1,000, Rotman says, and "even the possibility of getting an $85,000 or $25,000 grant is a terrific sign of things going in the right direction."

The Connecticut Green Party disagrees. "If they want to have a two-party system and they want to finance it through this fund, fine," says Mike DeRosa, the party's state co-chair. "But don't go out and say this is campaign finance reform, because it's not. It's working very well for the two major parties, but it's not working for third parties and independent candidates."

Not one of the Green Party's five candidate for state House or Senate has qualified for public funding in this year's election.

Forcing the third-party candidates to petition without making Democrats and Republicans do the same is discriminatory, DeRosa says.

"What is so different about third parties that we have to petition?" asks DeRosa. "You can't set two separate standards for two political parties."

In 2005 the Green Party of Connecticut filed a discrimination lawsuit against the State Elections Enforcement Commission, which oversees the new campaign finance law and the awarding of campaign grants.

That lawsuit should be decided in January, a Bridgeport district judge announced at a court hearing last week. Whichever side loses will inevitably appeal the decision and the hope is that the matter will be settled in time for the 2010 elections when state legislators' and the governor's offices are up for grabs.

"I call it the 'No Democrat or Republican Left Behind' law," says DeRosa. "If we don't get access to this money, then it isn't the Connecticut election fund, it's a Democrat and Republican election fund."


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