A Kelowna city council candidate from last month’s election has been fined $100 by Elections BC for an “inadvertent” issue with her campaign signs. In a press release issued Wednesday, Elections BC says Elaine McMurray violated local campaign finance law by not including all required information in her sign authorization statement. McMurray secured 6,292 votes in the election, finishing in 15th place. Only eight councilors were elected. On September 12, Elections BC had received a complaint about McMurray’s lawn signs. By law, campaign signs must identify the candidate’s financial agent, indicate that the sign was authorized by the financial agent, and include a phone number, email address, or mailing address where the financial agent can be contacted . After the complaint, Elections BC contacted McMurray and asked her to add a full authorization statement to her signs. In response, she purchased 300 stickers at a cost of $339 and applied them to her 150 double-sided signs. The plates themselves cost $3,312. Despite her compliance, Elections BC director of investigations Adam Barnes recently issued a $100 fine. Violating the law carries a fine of up to $5,000, but Barnes noted that McMurray’s violation was not “egregious.” “The lack of an authorization statement would not likely have misled a reader to conclude that a party other than your campaign sponsored the ads,” he wrote in his decision. “You indicated that the publication of the ads without the authorization statement was inadvertent … Once contacted by Elections BC, you quickly and cooperatively modified the ads where possible.” This was McMurray’s first time running for public office. Candidates in Squamish and Victoria were also fined for similar violations of the law.
