Gannon, Patrick. Hello Amy

Transcription

1 Gannon, Patrick From: Sent: To: Subject: Steffens, Monday, November 23, :56 AM Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) Philip E Berger Comm - reports Hello Amy I am getting ready to review reports filed for Philip E Berger Comm, and note that these were created electronically but filed on paper. Can you provide me with data files for the reports from 2013 Mid Year forward? I would really appreciate if you could these to me, it will save me about a week of data entry. Thanks E. Steffens Field Auditor State Board of Elections Campaign Finance Telephone (919) Website 1

2 Gannon, Patrick From: Sent: To: Subject: Amy B Ellis <amybellis@nc.rr.com> Monday, November 30, :01 PM Steffens, RE: Philip E Berger Comm - reports Sure, I can try! I may need to get with our software company Aristotle to find out how to go back and get the data in a format for you. From: Steffens, [mailto:.steffens@ncsbe.gov] Sent: Monday, November 23, :56 AM To: Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) Subject: Philip E Berger Comm - reports Hello Amy I am getting ready to review reports filed for Philip E Berger Comm, and note that these were created electronically but filed on paper. Can you provide me with data files for the reports from 2013 Mid Year forward? I would really appreciate if you could these to me, it will save me about a week of data entry. Thanks E. Steffens Field Auditor State Board of Elections Campaign Finance Telephone (919) Website 1

3 Gannon, Patrick From: Sent: To: Subject: Steffens, Monday, November 30, :03 PM Amy B Ellis RE: Philip E Berger Comm - reports Hi Amy I would really appreciate it. I have entered the 2013 data, so it would only be the 2014/2015 reports. Many thanks From: Amy B Ellis [mailto:amybellis@nc.rr.com] Sent: Monday, November 30, :01 PM To: Steffens, Subject: RE: Philip E Berger Comm reports Sure, I can try! I may need to get with our software company Aristotle to find out how to go back and get the data in a format for you. From: Steffens, [mailto:.steffens@ncsbe.gov] Sent: Monday, November 23, :56 AM To: Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) Subject: Philip E Berger Comm - reports Hello Amy I am getting ready to review reports filed for Philip E Berger Comm, and note that these were created electronically but filed on paper. Can you provide me with data files for the reports from 2013 Mid Year forward? I would really appreciate if you could these to me, it will save me about a week of data entry. Thanks E. Steffens Field Auditor State Board of Elections Campaign Finance Telephone (919) Website 1

4 Gannon, Patrick From: Sent: To: Subject: Importance: Steffens, Wednesday, December 09, :24 PM Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) RE: Philip E Berger Comm - reports High Hi Amy Have you had any luck obtaining the 2015/2015 data files? Can you let me know asap. If you can t get them I need to get the data entry done. Thanks From: Steffens, Sent: Monday, November 30, :03 PM To: 'Amy B Ellis' Subject: RE: Philip E Berger Comm reports Hi Amy I would really appreciate it. I have entered the 2013 data, so it would only be the 2014/2015 reports. Many thanks From: Amy B Ellis [mailto:amybellis@nc.rr.com] Sent: Monday, November 30, :01 PM To: Steffens, Subject: RE: Philip E Berger Comm reports Sure, I can try! I may need to get with our software company Aristotle to find out how to go back and get the data in a format for you. From: Steffens, [mailto:.steffens@ncsbe.gov] Sent: Monday, November 23, :56 AM To: Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) Subject: Philip E Berger Comm - reports Hello Amy I am getting ready to review reports filed for Philip E Berger Comm, and note that these were created electronically but filed on paper. Can you provide me with data files for the reports from 2013 Mid Year forward? I would really appreciate if you could these to me, it will save me about a week of data entry. 1

5 Thanks E. Steffens Field Auditor State Board of Elections Campaign Finance Telephone (919) Website 2

6 Gannon, Patrick From: Sent: To: Subject: Steffens, Monday, February 15, :33 AM Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) Philip E Berger Committee Hello Amy, Are you able to provide me with the data files for the 2015 Mid Year and Year End reports for the Philip E Berger Committee? Regards E. Steffens Field Auditor State Board of Elections Campaign Finance Telephone (919) Website 1

7 Gannon, Patrick From: Sent: To: Subject: Attachments: Steffens, Tuesday, April 05, :49 AM Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) Philip E. Berger Committee - Report Review Expense Purposes.xlsx; Address_Occupation.xlsx Hello Amy, Thank you for your time yesterday. As discussed I have completed a review of the Berger financial reports from the 2009 Year End Semi Annual to the 2014 Fourth Quarter. The following is a list of items that either require checking, additional information, or forfeiture. I have given as much information as possible, however if you have questions about any of these issues, let me know. 1. The following contributions appear to have exceeded contribution limits. Please provide alternate information that shows any of these were received on a different date, which would then cause them to not be over the limit. If you find that these were received on the dates recorded, the overage amounts must be forfeited. NCSFAA Inc PAC $ /06/08 $ /07/09 $ /01/10 election period 11/05/08 to 05/04/10 Over by $3000 Gene Minton 63 Golf Course Rd Littleton $ /3/11 $ /30/11 $ /11/12 election period 11/03/10 to 05/08/12 Over by $1000 Walter Williams and Walter L Williams are they the same person? both of 207 Crown Point Rd Greenville $ /18/12 $ /16/12 Election period 05/09/12 to 11/06/12 Over by $2000 if these are the same person United Furniture Industries PAC $2000 on 11/08/12 $2500 on 01/15/13 election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $500 W Trent Ragland $ /19/12 $ /26/13 $ /21/13 1

8 election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $1000 NCSFAA Inc PAC $ /29/13 $ /29/14 Election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $ The following contributions appear to be either from business entities, or from non registered committees. If you are able to secure these checks, and they show a different name than that reported, please provide me with copies of the checks, and I can check to make sure they are registered. If the checks were in the names listed below, then these would be considered prohibited and would require forfeiture. Great Living Communities $50 10/04/10 not registered as a pol comm Forfeit $50 Guilford Orthopaedics $ /17/12 no PAC registered in this name. Greensboro Orthopaedics PAC registered in 2015 Forfeit $2800 EHealth PAC 1615 L ST NW Ste 650 Washington DC $1000 on 10/04/12 Can t find this PAC registered Forfeit $ The following contributions were reported as being received during a legislative session. Each PAC in question either has a registered lobbyist, or the parent entity has a registered lobbyist. If these were received on dates other than those reported, please provide some tangible evidence for a date change. Committee Date Amount Session FMR LLC PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 Green Industry Council 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Propane Gas Assn PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Retail Merchants Assn PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Pork Council PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 Lowes Companies Inc PAC 01/27/ /26/11 06/19/11 NC Assisted Living Assn Pac 01/27/ /26/11 06/19/11 4. A number of expense purposes and codes either nee additional information, or a possible change to the code that was provided. The attached spreadsheet (expense purposes) shows four tabs. Expense Purposes please see the column Auditor Notes, which details the additional information needed. American Express the entries on this tab were paid to American Express. Was this a committee credit card? If so, these items all should be recorded on Debts and Obligations. Then, when a payment is made to American Express this should be recorded as a Debt Payment. There are no entity names and addresses associated with any of these entries, whereas if they were recorded as debts, the incurred items would be listed by entity name and address. Please provide the name and address for each entity that was initially paid. Some entries also need additional purpose information. Berger Law Firm this tab lists payments made to the Berger Law Firm. Please see if there was a contract/agreement in place between the law firm and the campaign, and if so provide me with a copy of this. The campaign should only be 2

9 paying for exactly the services/items they use or receive, and so a monthly or bi monthly fee should only be paid if there is a contract or agreement in place. Philip E. Berger this tab lists expenses paid to the candidate, mostly for mileage. Please provide a travel log that justifies these payments. If no travel log was used, please advise how the candidate and campaign determined how much was required to be reimbursed. In addition to the information listed on this spreadsheet, some expenses were recorded with a form of payment of Other. This should not be used, as each form of payment must be designated. As most of these appear to be fees pay on online donations I have recorded them as EFT (Electronic Funds Transfers). Your vendor should make sure that the selections for form of payment are corrected, there should be no other. 5. Some occupation information was missing or incomplete for individual contributors. The attached spreadsheet is highlighted in yellow with information I found in earlier reports, and in red for the items that are missing. Please make best efforts to secure the missing information. The majority of these are retired persons. You should make an attempt to determine at least the industry the person retired from. If you can provide me with any additional information, I can add this to our data file. In addition, a large number of job title/profession and employer name/specific field information was switched on your reports, with job title being shown in the employer name field and vice versa. All items were entered in the correct fields when the reports were data entered. However, you should correct your database, to make sure that all entries are in the correct fields. 6. Numerous 48 Hour Notices were filed; however when these contributions were subsequently recorded on reports they were recorded using a different date. For future filings, please make sure the received date is used both on the 48 Hour Notice and on the report. 7. Sum to date totals are showing in correct amounts in the data file that was created internally. We discussed on the telephone that the third party software you are using calculated the sum to date totals for the full election cycle, instead of for each election. Your vendor should take steps to correct this issue. 8. A contribution from William A Current was recorded on the 2010 Third Quarter as a Contribution from Individual; however this was from his campaign and so should have been recorded as Contributions from Other Political Committees. Similarly an expense on the 2013 Year End Semi Annual Report to High Point Republican Party was recorded as an operating expense, but should be a Contribution to Candidates/Political Committees. A contribution from Honeywell International PAC was recorded on the 2014 First Quarter as a Contribution from Individual. Nothing is required to be corrected for these entries, however future reports should show these type of entries in the correct place on the report. 9. The First Citizens Bank account was created with a code of A. Starting with the 2012 Third Quarter, this code appears to have been changed to 1. However, as account numbers are not listed on reports I am unable to determine if this is the same account. Please confirm if the First Citizens Bank account is the same one the committee has always had, and advise why the account code was changed. An account code should not change, but should continue for the life of the account. Additionally, a code should not be used for multiple accounts, each account code must be unique. 10. The 2013 Year End Semi Annual Report lists a contribution from Coca Cola Consolidated PAC, a NC registered state PAC; however when checking PAC reports, this expense was recorded as made by the Coca Cola Bottling Co PAC, a federally registered PAC. Please can you provide a copy of this check, so that I can determine who the funds actually came from. 11. The following are possible duplicate contributions, or are from family members and the names do not reflect a suffix such as Jr., Sr. etc. Please check into these contributions and let me know if they were the same person, different people etc. 3

10 Graeme Keith of 2301 Richardson Dr Charlotte (Real Estate, The Keith Corp) $1500 on 04/04/14 and $1000 on 02/28/14 AND Graeme Keith of 5935 Carnedie Blvd Charlotte (Real Estate, The Keith Corp) $1000 on 04/04/14 O Temple Sloan of 3026 Randolph Dr Raleigh ($5000 on 03/31/14) AND O Temple Sloan of 3604 Williamsborough Ct Raleigh ($4000 on 12/12/13 and $5000 on 06/10/14) both working at General Parts International If this is the same person, he has exceeded the limit by $ The 2014 Second Quarter original filing recorded an in kind contribution of $5000 made by Champ Mitchell on 05/30/14 for fundraiser catering; however this entry was removed on an amended report. This individual made a subsequent $5000 contribution on 10/23/14, and so this would have been considered over the contribution limit if you take into consideration the in kind contribution. Why was this in kind contribution removed from the amendment? 13. The NC Beer & Wine Wholesalers Assn PAC reported making a contribution of $1, on 09/04/12; however this is not recorded on your reports. Please check your records to determine if this check was received but not reported. 14. Three PAC contributions were reported in a different amount on your reports than the amount recorded by the PACs. Please check the following three contributions to determine if the amount was reported correctly. Committee Amount/Date on Berger Amount/Date on PAC Southeast Anesthesia Assoc PAC $2000 on 04/16/10 $3000 on 04/13/10 Verizon Good Govt Club of NC $500 on 05/11/10 $1000 on 05/04/10 NC Chiropractic Assn Inc PAC $1000 on 05/11/10 $500 on 05/07/ A number of contributions from PACs were not recorded on the PAC reports. I will be contacting these PACs to determine why they did not report making these contributions. If you are able to provide me with copies of these checks, I would appreciate that. Committee Date Amount Altria Group Inc 05/10/ Anesthesiologists of the Triad PAC 01/17/ Blue Cross Blue Shield of NC PAC 08/30/ Engineers PAC of NC 01/27/ Liberty Mutual PAC 10/04/ NC Indian American PAC 10/25/ Once you have completed your research, if any information is required to be corrected, please make corrections and file amended reports. Please note, any reports amended should only include a cover, detailed summary, and any transaction pages that actually change. As an alternative, your amendments can be filed electronically. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me. Regards E. Steffens 4

11 Field Auditor State Board of Elections Campaign Finance Telephone (919) Website 5

12 Gannon, Patrick From: Sent: To: Subject: Attachments: Steffens, Tuesday, March 07, :08 PM Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) FW: Philip E. Berger Committee - Report Review Expense Purposes.xlsx; Address_Occupation.xlsx Hello Amy, We have had an internal policy change, that will affect some of the items in my below, specifically related to forfeitures. As of the date of my initial contact below, transactions occurring during or prior to the 2014 election cycle are now outside of the records retention period. Forfeitures assessed for prohibited contributions and expenditures which are now outside of the retention period have been waived. As a result, the committee s forfeiture assessment has been changed. Date of Original Amount of Original Waived Forfeiture New Forfeiture Forfeiture Notice Forfeiture Amount Amount Due 04/05/2016 $19, $14, $5, Can you please give me an estimate as to when you think you will have answers to the questions in my below. Regards From: Steffens, Sent: Tuesday, April 05, :49 AM To: Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) <amybellis@nc.rr.com> Subject: Philip E. Berger Committee Report Review Hello Amy, Thank you for your time yesterday. As discussed I have completed a review of the Berger financial reports from the 2009 Year End Semi Annual to the 2014 Fourth Quarter. The following is a list of items that either require checking, additional information, or forfeiture. I have given as much information as possible, however if you have questions about any of these issues, let me know. 1. The following contributions appear to have exceeded contribution limits. Please provide alternate information that shows any of these were received on a different date, which would then cause them to not be over the limit. If you find that these were received on the dates recorded, the overage amounts must be forfeited. NCSFAA Inc PAC $ /06/08 $ /07/09 $ /01/10 election period 11/05/08 to 05/04/10 Over by $3000 1

13 Gene Minton 63 Golf Course Rd Littleton $ /3/11 $ /30/11 $ /11/12 election period 11/03/10 to 05/08/12 Over by $1000 Walter Williams and Walter L Williams are they the same person? both of 207 Crown Point Rd Greenville $ /18/12 $ /16/12 Election period 05/09/12 to 11/06/12 Over by $2000 if these are the same person United Furniture Industries PAC $2000 on 11/08/12 $2500 on 01/15/13 election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $500 W Trent Ragland $ /19/12 $ /26/13 $ /21/13 election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $1000 NCSFAA Inc PAC $ /29/13 $ /29/14 Election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $ The following contributions appear to be either from business entities, or from non registered committees. If you are able to secure these checks, and they show a different name than that reported, please provide me with copies of the checks, and I can check to make sure they are registered. If the checks were in the names listed below, then these would be considered prohibited and would require forfeiture. Great Living Communities $50 10/04/10 not registered as a pol comm Forfeit $50 Guilford Orthopaedics $ /17/12 no PAC registered in this name. Greensboro Orthopaedics PAC registered in 2015 Forfeit $2800 EHealth PAC 1615 L ST NW Ste 650 Washington DC $1000 on 10/04/12 2

14 Can t find this PAC registered Forfeit $ The following contributions were reported as being received during a legislative session. Each PAC in question either has a registered lobbyist, or the parent entity has a registered lobbyist. If these were received on dates other than those reported, please provide some tangible evidence for a date change. Committee Date Amount Session FMR LLC PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 Green Industry Council 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Propane Gas Assn PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Retail Merchants Assn PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Pork Council PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 Lowes Companies Inc PAC 01/27/ /26/11 06/19/11 NC Assisted Living Assn Pac 01/27/ /26/11 06/19/11 4. A number of expense purposes and codes either nee additional information, or a possible change to the code that was provided. The attached spreadsheet (expense purposes) shows four tabs. Expense Purposes please see the column Auditor Notes, which details the additional information needed. American Express the entries on this tab were paid to American Express. Was this a committee credit card? If so, these items all should be recorded on Debts and Obligations. Then, when a payment is made to American Express this should be recorded as a Debt Payment. There are no entity names and addresses associated with any of these entries, whereas if they were recorded as debts, the incurred items would be listed by entity name and address. Please provide the name and address for each entity that was initially paid. Some entries also need additional purpose information. Berger Law Firm this tab lists payments made to the Berger Law Firm. Please see if there was a contract/agreement in place between the law firm and the campaign, and if so provide me with a copy of this. The campaign should only be paying for exactly the services/items they use or receive, and so a monthly or bi monthly fee should only be paid if there is a contract or agreement in place. Philip E. Berger this tab lists expenses paid to the candidate, mostly for mileage. Please provide a travel log that justifies these payments. If no travel log was used, please advise how the candidate and campaign determined how much was required to be reimbursed. In addition to the information listed on this spreadsheet, some expenses were recorded with a form of payment of Other. This should not be used, as each form of payment must be designated. As most of these appear to be fees pay on online donations I have recorded them as EFT (Electronic Funds Transfers). Your vendor should make sure that the selections for form of payment are corrected, there should be no other. 5. Some occupation information was missing or incomplete for individual contributors. The attached spreadsheet is highlighted in yellow with information I found in earlier reports, and in red for the items that are missing. Please make best efforts to secure the missing information. The majority of these are retired persons. You should make an attempt to determine at least the industry the person retired from. If you can provide me with any additional information, I can add this to our data file. In addition, a large number of job title/profession and employer name/specific field information was switched on your reports, with job title being shown in the employer name field and vice versa. All items were entered in the correct fields when the reports were data entered. However, you should correct your database, to make sure that all entries are in the correct fields. 6. Numerous 48 Hour Notices were filed; however when these contributions were subsequently recorded on reports they were recorded using a different date. For future filings, please make sure the received date is used both on the 48 Hour Notice and on the report. 3

15 7. Sum to date totals are showing in correct amounts in the data file that was created internally. We discussed on the telephone that the third party software you are using calculated the sum to date totals for the full election cycle, instead of for each election. Your vendor should take steps to correct this issue. 8. A contribution from William A Current was recorded on the 2010 Third Quarter as a Contribution from Individual; however this was from his campaign and so should have been recorded as Contributions from Other Political Committees. Similarly an expense on the 2013 Year End Semi Annual Report to High Point Republican Party was recorded as an operating expense, but should be a Contribution to Candidates/Political Committees. A contribution from Honeywell International PAC was recorded on the 2014 First Quarter as a Contribution from Individual. Nothing is required to be corrected for these entries, however future reports should show these type of entries in the correct place on the report. 9. The First Citizens Bank account was created with a code of A. Starting with the 2012 Third Quarter, this code appears to have been changed to 1. However, as account numbers are not listed on reports I am unable to determine if this is the same account. Please confirm if the First Citizens Bank account is the same one the committee has always had, and advise why the account code was changed. An account code should not change, but should continue for the life of the account. Additionally, a code should not be used for multiple accounts, each account code must be unique. 10. The 2013 Year End Semi Annual Report lists a contribution from Coca Cola Consolidated PAC, a NC registered state PAC; however when checking PAC reports, this expense was recorded as made by the Coca Cola Bottling Co PAC, a federally registered PAC. Please can you provide a copy of this check, so that I can determine who the funds actually came from. 11. The following are possible duplicate contributions, or are from family members and the names do not reflect a suffix such as Jr., Sr. etc. Please check into these contributions and let me know if they were the same person, different people etc. Graeme Keith of 2301 Richardson Dr Charlotte (Real Estate, The Keith Corp) $1500 on 04/04/14 and $1000 on 02/28/14 AND Graeme Keith of 5935 Carnedie Blvd Charlotte (Real Estate, The Keith Corp) $1000 on 04/04/14 O Temple Sloan of 3026 Randolph Dr Raleigh ($5000 on 03/31/14) AND O Temple Sloan of 3604 Williamsborough Ct Raleigh ($4000 on 12/12/13 and $5000 on 06/10/14) both working at General Parts International If this is the same person, he has exceeded the limit by $ The 2014 Second Quarter original filing recorded an in kind contribution of $5000 made by Champ Mitchell on 05/30/14 for fundraiser catering; however this entry was removed on an amended report. This individual made a subsequent $5000 contribution on 10/23/14, and so this would have been considered over the contribution limit if you take into consideration the in kind contribution. Why was this in kind contribution removed from the amendment? 13. The NC Beer & Wine Wholesalers Assn PAC reported making a contribution of $1, on 09/04/12; however this is not recorded on your reports. Please check your records to determine if this check was received but not reported. 14. Three PAC contributions were reported in a different amount on your reports than the amount recorded by the PACs. Please check the following three contributions to determine if the amount was reported correctly. Committee Amount/Date on Berger Amount/Date on PAC Southeast Anesthesia Assoc PAC $2000 on 04/16/10 $3000 on 04/13/10 Verizon Good Govt Club of NC $500 on 05/11/10 $1000 on 05/04/10 NC Chiropractic Assn Inc PAC $1000 on 05/11/10 $500 on 05/07/10 4

16 15. A number of contributions from PACs were not recorded on the PAC reports. I will be contacting these PACs to determine why they did not report making these contributions. If you are able to provide me with copies of these checks, I would appreciate that. Committee Date Amount Altria Group Inc 05/10/ Anesthesiologists of the Triad PAC 01/17/ Blue Cross Blue Shield of NC PAC 08/30/ Engineers PAC of NC 01/27/ Liberty Mutual PAC 10/04/ NC Indian American PAC 10/25/ Once you have completed your research, if any information is required to be corrected, please make corrections and file amended reports. Please note, any reports amended should only include a cover, detailed summary, and any transaction pages that actually change. As an alternative, your amendments can be filed electronically. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me. Regards E. Steffens Field Auditor State Board of Elections Campaign Finance Telephone (919) Website 5

17 Gannon, Patrick From: Sent: To: Subject: Steffens, Friday, April 07, :56 AM Amy Ellis RE: Philip E. Berger Committee - Report Review Hi Amy Thanks for letting me know. I have also just audited Chad Barefoot, and so I will the details of the audit to you. There are minimal issues with that one. It may be Monday before I can get an to you, I am out of the office for part of the day today. Good luck with tax season! From: Amy Ellis [mailto:amybellis@nc.rr.com] Sent: Thursday, April 06, :24 PM To: Steffens, <.Steffens@ncsbe.gov> Subject: RE: Philip E. Berger Committee Report Review Hi, Thanks for the update and the information. I hope to be able to work on all of this after April 18th. As a CPA during tax season, I have been so busy and haven't had a chance to meet with the people that can help with some of this as well as dig out the old records. My goal will be mid May. Thanks again. Amy From: Steffens, [mailto:.steffens@ncsbe.gov] Sent: Tuesday, March 07, :09 PM To: Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) Subject: FW: Philip E. Berger Committee - Report Review Hello Amy, We have had an internal policy change, that will affect some of the items in my below, specifically related to forfeitures. As of the date of my initial contact below, transactions occurring during or prior to the 2014 election cycle are now outside of the records retention period. Forfeitures assessed for prohibited contributions and expenditures which are now outside of the retention period have been waived. As a result, the committee s forfeiture assessment has been changed. Date of Original Amount of Original Waived Forfeiture New Forfeiture Forfeiture Notice Forfeiture Amount Amount Due 04/05/2016 $19, $14, $5,

18 Can you please give me an estimate as to when you think you will have answers to the questions in my below. Regards From: Steffens, Sent: Tuesday, April 05, :49 AM To: Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) <amybellis@nc.rr.com> Subject: Philip E. Berger Committee Report Review Hello Amy, Thank you for your time yesterday. As discussed I have completed a review of the Berger financial reports from the 2009 Year End Semi Annual to the 2014 Fourth Quarter. The following is a list of items that either require checking, additional information, or forfeiture. I have given as much information as possible, however if you have questions about any of these issues, let me know. 1. The following contributions appear to have exceeded contribution limits. Please provide alternate information that shows any of these were received on a different date, which would then cause them to not be over the limit. If you find that these were received on the dates recorded, the overage amounts must be forfeited. NCSFAA Inc PAC $ /06/08 $ /07/09 $ /01/10 election period 11/05/08 to 05/04/10 Over by $3000 Gene Minton 63 Golf Course Rd Littleton $ /3/11 $ /30/11 $ /11/12 election period 11/03/10 to 05/08/12 Over by $1000 Walter Williams and Walter L Williams are they the same person? both of 207 Crown Point Rd Greenville $ /18/12 $ /16/12 Election period 05/09/12 to 11/06/12 Over by $2000 if these are the same person United Furniture Industries PAC $2000 on 11/08/12 $2500 on 01/15/13 election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $500 W Trent Ragland $ /19/12 2

19 $ /26/13 $ /21/13 election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $1000 NCSFAA Inc PAC $ /29/13 $ /29/14 Election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $ The following contributions appear to be either from business entities, or from non registered committees. If you are able to secure these checks, and they show a different name than that reported, please provide me with copies of the checks, and I can check to make sure they are registered. If the checks were in the names listed below, then these would be considered prohibited and would require forfeiture. Great Living Communities $50 10/04/10 not registered as a pol comm Forfeit $50 Guilford Orthopaedics $ /17/12 no PAC registered in this name. Greensboro Orthopaedics PAC registered in 2015 Forfeit $2800 EHealth PAC 1615 L ST NW Ste 650 Washington DC $1000 on 10/04/12 Can t find this PAC registered Forfeit $ The following contributions were reported as being received during a legislative session. Each PAC in question either has a registered lobbyist, or the parent entity has a registered lobbyist. If these were received on dates other than those reported, please provide some tangible evidence for a date change. Committee Date Amount Session FMR LLC PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 Green Industry Council 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Propane Gas Assn PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Retail Merchants Assn PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Pork Council PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 Lowes Companies Inc PAC 01/27/ /26/11 06/19/11 NC Assisted Living Assn Pac 01/27/ /26/11 06/19/11 4. A number of expense purposes and codes either nee additional information, or a possible change to the code that was provided. The attached spreadsheet (expense purposes) shows four tabs. Expense Purposes please see the column Auditor Notes, which details the additional information needed. American Express the entries on this tab were paid to American Express. Was this a committee credit card? If so, these items all should be recorded on Debts and Obligations. Then, when a payment is made to American Express this should be recorded as a Debt Payment. There are no entity names and addresses associated with any of these entries, whereas if they were recorded as debts, the incurred items would be listed by entity name and address. Please provide the name and address for each entity that was initially paid. Some entries also need additional purpose information. 3

20 Berger Law Firm this tab lists payments made to the Berger Law Firm. Please see if there was a contract/agreement in place between the law firm and the campaign, and if so provide me with a copy of this. The campaign should only be paying for exactly the services/items they use or receive, and so a monthly or bi monthly fee should only be paid if there is a contract or agreement in place. Philip E. Berger this tab lists expenses paid to the candidate, mostly for mileage. Please provide a travel log that justifies these payments. If no travel log was used, please advise how the candidate and campaign determined how much was required to be reimbursed. In addition to the information listed on this spreadsheet, some expenses were recorded with a form of payment of Other. This should not be used, as each form of payment must be designated. As most of these appear to be fees pay on online donations I have recorded them as EFT (Electronic Funds Transfers). Your vendor should make sure that the selections for form of payment are corrected, there should be no other. 5. Some occupation information was missing or incomplete for individual contributors. The attached spreadsheet is highlighted in yellow with information I found in earlier reports, and in red for the items that are missing. Please make best efforts to secure the missing information. The majority of these are retired persons. You should make an attempt to determine at least the industry the person retired from. If you can provide me with any additional information, I can add this to our data file. In addition, a large number of job title/profession and employer name/specific field information was switched on your reports, with job title being shown in the employer name field and vice versa. All items were entered in the correct fields when the reports were data entered. However, you should correct your database, to make sure that all entries are in the correct fields. 6. Numerous 48 Hour Notices were filed; however when these contributions were subsequently recorded on reports they were recorded using a different date. For future filings, please make sure the received date is used both on the 48 Hour Notice and on the report. 7. Sum to date totals are showing in correct amounts in the data file that was created internally. We discussed on the telephone that the third party software you are using calculated the sum to date totals for the full election cycle, instead of for each election. Your vendor should take steps to correct this issue. 8. A contribution from William A Current was recorded on the 2010 Third Quarter as a Contribution from Individual; however this was from his campaign and so should have been recorded as Contributions from Other Political Committees. Similarly an expense on the 2013 Year End Semi Annual Report to High Point Republican Party was recorded as an operating expense, but should be a Contribution to Candidates/Political Committees. A contribution from Honeywell International PAC was recorded on the 2014 First Quarter as a Contribution from Individual. Nothing is required to be corrected for these entries, however future reports should show these type of entries in the correct place on the report. 9. The First Citizens Bank account was created with a code of A. Starting with the 2012 Third Quarter, this code appears to have been changed to 1. However, as account numbers are not listed on reports I am unable to determine if this is the same account. Please confirm if the First Citizens Bank account is the same one the committee has always had, and advise why the account code was changed. An account code should not change, but should continue for the life of the account. Additionally, a code should not be used for multiple accounts, each account code must be unique. 10. The 2013 Year End Semi Annual Report lists a contribution from Coca Cola Consolidated PAC, a NC registered state PAC; however when checking PAC reports, this expense was recorded as made by the Coca Cola Bottling Co PAC, a federally registered PAC. Please can you provide a copy of this check, so that I can determine who the funds actually came from. 4

21 11. The following are possible duplicate contributions, or are from family members and the names do not reflect a suffix such as Jr., Sr. etc. Please check into these contributions and let me know if they were the same person, different people etc. Graeme Keith of 2301 Richardson Dr Charlotte (Real Estate, The Keith Corp) $1500 on 04/04/14 and $1000 on 02/28/14 AND Graeme Keith of 5935 Carnedie Blvd Charlotte (Real Estate, The Keith Corp) $1000 on 04/04/14 O Temple Sloan of 3026 Randolph Dr Raleigh ($5000 on 03/31/14) AND O Temple Sloan of 3604 Williamsborough Ct Raleigh ($4000 on 12/12/13 and $5000 on 06/10/14) both working at General Parts International If this is the same person, he has exceeded the limit by $ The 2014 Second Quarter original filing recorded an in kind contribution of $5000 made by Champ Mitchell on 05/30/14 for fundraiser catering; however this entry was removed on an amended report. This individual made a subsequent $5000 contribution on 10/23/14, and so this would have been considered over the contribution limit if you take into consideration the in kind contribution. Why was this in kind contribution removed from the amendment? 13. The NC Beer & Wine Wholesalers Assn PAC reported making a contribution of $1, on 09/04/12; however this is not recorded on your reports. Please check your records to determine if this check was received but not reported. 14. Three PAC contributions were reported in a different amount on your reports than the amount recorded by the PACs. Please check the following three contributions to determine if the amount was reported correctly. Committee Amount/Date on Berger Amount/Date on PAC Southeast Anesthesia Assoc PAC $2000 on 04/16/10 $3000 on 04/13/10 Verizon Good Govt Club of NC $500 on 05/11/10 $1000 on 05/04/10 NC Chiropractic Assn Inc PAC $1000 on 05/11/10 $500 on 05/07/ A number of contributions from PACs were not recorded on the PAC reports. I will be contacting these PACs to determine why they did not report making these contributions. If you are able to provide me with copies of these checks, I would appreciate that. Committee Date Amount Altria Group Inc 05/10/ Anesthesiologists of the Triad PAC 01/17/ Blue Cross Blue Shield of NC PAC 08/30/ Engineers PAC of NC 01/27/ Liberty Mutual PAC 10/04/ NC Indian American PAC 10/25/ Once you have completed your research, if any information is required to be corrected, please make corrections and file amended reports. Please note, any reports amended should only include a cover, detailed summary, and any transaction pages that actually change. As an alternative, your amendments can be filed electronically. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me. Regards 5

22 E. Steffens Field Auditor State Board of Elections Campaign Finance Telephone (919) Website 6

23 Gannon, Patrick From: Sent: To: Subject: Amy Ellis Thursday, April 06, :24 PM Steffens, RE: Philip E. Berger Committee - Report Review Hi, Thanks for the update and the information. I hope to be able to work on all of this after April 18th. As a CPA during tax season, I have been so busy and haven't had a chance to meet with the people that can help with some of this as well as dig out the old records. My goal will be mid May. Thanks again. Amy From: Steffens, [mailto:.steffens@ncsbe.gov] Sent: Tuesday, March 07, :09 PM To: Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) Subject: FW: Philip E. Berger Committee - Report Review Hello Amy, We have had an internal policy change, that will affect some of the items in my below, specifically related to forfeitures. As of the date of my initial contact below, transactions occurring during or prior to the 2014 election cycle are now outside of the records retention period. Forfeitures assessed for prohibited contributions and expenditures which are now outside of the retention period have been waived. As a result, the committee s forfeiture assessment has been changed. Date of Original Amount of Original Waived Forfeiture New Forfeiture Forfeiture Notice Forfeiture Amount Amount Due 04/05/2016 $19, $14, $5, Can you please give me an estimate as to when you think you will have answers to the questions in my below. Regards From: Steffens, Sent: Tuesday, April 05, :49 AM To: Amy B Ellis (amybellis@nc.rr.com) <amybellis@nc.rr.com> Subject: Philip E. Berger Committee Report Review Hello Amy, Thank you for your time yesterday. As discussed I have completed a review of the Berger financial reports from the 2009 Year End Semi Annual to the 2014 Fourth Quarter. The following is a list of items that either require checking, additional 1

24 information, or forfeiture. I have given as much information as possible, however if you have questions about any of these issues, let me know. 1. The following contributions appear to have exceeded contribution limits. Please provide alternate information that shows any of these were received on a different date, which would then cause them to not be over the limit. If you find that these were received on the dates recorded, the overage amounts must be forfeited. NCSFAA Inc PAC $ /06/08 $ /07/09 $ /01/10 election period 11/05/08 to 05/04/10 Over by $3000 Gene Minton 63 Golf Course Rd Littleton $ /3/11 $ /30/11 $ /11/12 election period 11/03/10 to 05/08/12 Over by $1000 Walter Williams and Walter L Williams are they the same person? both of 207 Crown Point Rd Greenville $ /18/12 $ /16/12 Election period 05/09/12 to 11/06/12 Over by $2000 if these are the same person United Furniture Industries PAC $2000 on 11/08/12 $2500 on 01/15/13 election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $500 W Trent Ragland $ /19/12 $ /26/13 $ /21/13 election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $1000 NCSFAA Inc PAC $ /29/13 $ /29/14 Election period 11/07/12 to 05/06/14 Over by $ The following contributions appear to be either from business entities, or from non registered committees. If you are able to secure these checks, and they show a different name than that reported, please provide me with copies of the checks, and I can check to make sure they are registered. If the checks were in the names listed below, then these would be considered prohibited and would require forfeiture. Great Living Communities 2

25 $50 10/04/10 not registered as a pol comm Forfeit $50 Guilford Orthopaedics $ /17/12 no PAC registered in this name. Greensboro Orthopaedics PAC registered in 2015 Forfeit $2800 EHealth PAC 1615 L ST NW Ste 650 Washington DC $1000 on 10/04/12 Can t find this PAC registered Forfeit $ The following contributions were reported as being received during a legislative session. Each PAC in question either has a registered lobbyist, or the parent entity has a registered lobbyist. If these were received on dates other than those reported, please provide some tangible evidence for a date change. Committee Date Amount Session FMR LLC PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 Green Industry Council 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Propane Gas Assn PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Retail Merchants Assn PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 NC Pork Council PAC 05/18/ /12/10 07/10/10 Lowes Companies Inc PAC 01/27/ /26/11 06/19/11 NC Assisted Living Assn Pac 01/27/ /26/11 06/19/11 4. A number of expense purposes and codes either nee additional information, or a possible change to the code that was provided. The attached spreadsheet (expense purposes) shows four tabs. Expense Purposes please see the column Auditor Notes, which details the additional information needed. American Express the entries on this tab were paid to American Express. Was this a committee credit card? If so, these items all should be recorded on Debts and Obligations. Then, when a payment is made to American Express this should be recorded as a Debt Payment. There are no entity names and addresses associated with any of these entries, whereas if they were recorded as debts, the incurred items would be listed by entity name and address. Please provide the name and address for each entity that was initially paid. Some entries also need additional purpose information. Berger Law Firm this tab lists payments made to the Berger Law Firm. Please see if there was a contract/agreement in place between the law firm and the campaign, and if so provide me with a copy of this. The campaign should only be paying for exactly the services/items they use or receive, and so a monthly or bi monthly fee should only be paid if there is a contract or agreement in place. Philip E. Berger this tab lists expenses paid to the candidate, mostly for mileage. Please provide a travel log that justifies these payments. If no travel log was used, please advise how the candidate and campaign determined how much was required to be reimbursed. In addition to the information listed on this spreadsheet, some expenses were recorded with a form of payment of Other. This should not be used, as each form of payment must be designated. As most of these appear to be fees pay on online donations I have recorded them as EFT (Electronic Funds Transfers). Your vendor should make sure that the selections for form of payment are corrected, there should be no other. 5. Some occupation information was missing or incomplete for individual contributors. The attached spreadsheet is highlighted in yellow with information I found in earlier reports, and in red for the items that are missing. Please make best efforts to secure the missing information. The majority of these are retired persons. You should make an attempt to 3

26 determine at least the industry the person retired from. If you can provide me with any additional information, I can add this to our data file. In addition, a large number of job title/profession and employer name/specific field information was switched on your reports, with job title being shown in the employer name field and vice versa. All items were entered in the correct fields when the reports were data entered. However, you should correct your database, to make sure that all entries are in the correct fields. 6. Numerous 48 Hour Notices were filed; however when these contributions were subsequently recorded on reports they were recorded using a different date. For future filings, please make sure the received date is used both on the 48 Hour Notice and on the report. 7. Sum to date totals are showing in correct amounts in the data file that was created internally. We discussed on the telephone that the third party software you are using calculated the sum to date totals for the full election cycle, instead of for each election. Your vendor should take steps to correct this issue. 8. A contribution from William A Current was recorded on the 2010 Third Quarter as a Contribution from Individual; however this was from his campaign and so should have been recorded as Contributions from Other Political Committees. Similarly an expense on the 2013 Year End Semi Annual Report to High Point Republican Party was recorded as an operating expense, but should be a Contribution to Candidates/Political Committees. A contribution from Honeywell International PAC was recorded on the 2014 First Quarter as a Contribution from Individual. Nothing is required to be corrected for these entries, however future reports should show these type of entries in the correct place on the report. 9. The First Citizens Bank account was created with a code of A. Starting with the 2012 Third Quarter, this code appears to have been changed to 1. However, as account numbers are not listed on reports I am unable to determine if this is the same account. Please confirm if the First Citizens Bank account is the same one the committee has always had, and advise why the account code was changed. An account code should not change, but should continue for the life of the account. Additionally, a code should not be used for multiple accounts, each account code must be unique. 10. The 2013 Year End Semi Annual Report lists a contribution from Coca Cola Consolidated PAC, a NC registered state PAC; however when checking PAC reports, this expense was recorded as made by the Coca Cola Bottling Co PAC, a federally registered PAC. Please can you provide a copy of this check, so that I can determine who the funds actually came from. 11. The following are possible duplicate contributions, or are from family members and the names do not reflect a suffix such as Jr., Sr. etc. Please check into these contributions and let me know if they were the same person, different people etc. Graeme Keith of 2301 Richardson Dr Charlotte (Real Estate, The Keith Corp) $1500 on 04/04/14 and $1000 on 02/28/14 AND Graeme Keith of 5935 Carnedie Blvd Charlotte (Real Estate, The Keith Corp) $1000 on 04/04/14 O Temple Sloan of 3026 Randolph Dr Raleigh ($5000 on 03/31/14) AND O Temple Sloan of 3604 Williamsborough Ct Raleigh ($4000 on 12/12/13 and $5000 on 06/10/14) both working at General Parts International If this is the same person, he has exceeded the limit by $ The 2014 Second Quarter original filing recorded an in kind contribution of $5000 made by Champ Mitchell on 05/30/14 for fundraiser catering; however this entry was removed on an amended report. This individual made a 4