MAPPS PAC Announces Candidate Support in November 4 Election
The MAPPS Political Action Committee (MAPPS PAC) today announced it has provided $43,000 in support for 39 candidates running for the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives on November 4. Click here to read the full article.
MAPPS PAC Beginnings
Several years ago, in an effort to strengthen MAPPS influence, exposure and clout in Washington, D.C., the Board of Directors voted to create the MAPPS Political Action Committee or MAPPS PAC.
The PAC is the legal, ethical and professional way for membership organizations, such as MAPPS to engage in our great political process.
How the MAPPS PAC Works
The MAPPS PAC is a separate, segregated political fund that does NOT use dues money. The MAPPS PAC accepts voluntary, personal contributions from individual MAPPS Member Firm principals and executives to support candidates for Federal office who support the geospatial community and the free enterprise system.
An individual may contribute no more than $2,000 per year to the MAPPS PAC, according to Federal election law. The MAPPS PAC may contribute up to $5,000 per candidate per election. A primary election is considered a separate election from the general. So we may donate an aggregate sum of ten thousand dollars to a single candidate during an election cycle.
Once money has been raised, it can be contributed to candidates for federal office. FECA mandates that the moneys raised by the PAC are to be held in a separate bank account that is referred to as a separate segregated fund (SSF). By law, MAPPS cannot use its regular revenues from dues, and cannot use corporate funds, for political purposes. MAPPS must rely on the generous, voluntary, personal contributions of individual executives from its member firms. That is where the MAPPS PAC fits in.
PAC Laws in the United States
In 1975, during the post-Watergate era, the United States Congress created the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to administer and enforce the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA), the statute that governs the financing of federal elections. The FECA permitted groups, such as trade and professional associations, to form committees to collect voluntary, individual contributions from members in a pool, and to make contributions from those committees to candidates for Federal office.
FECA traces its roots to 1906, in the Tilden Act, passed at the behest of President Theodore Roosevelt. The Tilden act was often described as more loophole than law, and thus FECA was intended to close the loopholes. In 2002, the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (BCRA) sought to tightened the use of “soft money” (money used in a campaign, in such a manner previously not subject to FEC regulations) in federal elections. The intent of Congress was to keep corporate money out of the federal election process and have campaigns for federal office funded by private citizens.
According to FECA, Corporations are permitted to form political action committees and may solicit contributions from employees, or in the case of membership organization such as MAPPS, may solicit its members. MAPPS is the parent corporation of the MAPPS PAC. The PAC is allowed to accept voluntary contributions from MAPPS members.
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