Reinvent Albany Strongly Supports Thrust of NYC Campaign Finance Board’s Post-Election Recommendations

September 1, 2026

Reinvent Albany strongly supports many of the New York City Campaign Finance Board’s proposed improvements to campaign finance law. We thank CFB for meeting with us and other stakeholders while preparing recommendations for the post-election report. We urge the City Council to pass legislation based on CFB’s recommendations and the other critical anti-corruption measures we proposed below.

Reinvent Albany especially supports:

  • Removing the $10,000 cap on penalties for independent expenditure violations. When spending is unlimited, why cap penalties? According to the CFB, spending on IEs is skyrocketing; 15 independent expenditures spent over $1 million.
  • Improving the disclosure of who is actually funding independent expenditures. CFB’s proposal requiring the disclosure of the actual human person(s) paying for an IE is common sense. Currently, people behind IEs can hide contributions by routing money through PACs or other machinations.
  • Simplifying reporting for fundraising events like house parties and boosting bundling transparency. We support the CFB’s proposal to amend the law to more clearly define fundraisers and house parties. Reinvent Albany recommends all bundlers of campaign contributions, host committee members, and organizers be disclosed regardless of occasion or amount raised, including house parties and campaign-sponsored events.  

Reinvent Albany recommends that the City Council make other crucial improvements to campaign finance laws given the scandals of the last mayoral administration:

  • Expand doing-business restrictions on campaign contributions to include emergency contracts and subcontractors.
  • Require disclosure of beneficial owners of recipients of campaign finance disbursements. As reported by NBC, shell company LLCs received hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments for supposed consulting and other campaign services from Eric Adams’ terminated mayoral campaign, but do not appear to be active businesses typically engaged in campaign-related work.