Show Me the Money

This entry will address the year 2007 and a very large amount of money, almost one million dollars, that was contributed to Bradley PACs which he then "expended" and did not specifically itemize as to where and who it went to.

Since mid to late 2006 with firmer indicators in 2007, is the time frame we feel the quarry was being "quietly discussed", (also when all of the current Shelby County Commissioners and some of the Vincent officials were beginning their runs for office for the 2008 election cycle), those candidates would begin to amass their campaign "war chests" in mid 2006 through 2008.

Birmingham was also readying for elections in this time frame and the strong possibility of "undue influence", in the form of campaign contributions and "other considerations" for city & county officials is well documented through the Al. Com stories on the SWMA issue. Some of those are linked on this site.

These reports show money being contributed and expended at a much higher rate than any other years in Mr. Bradley's direct PACs. Why is that?

Did any of this money wind up in his personal accounts? Some of the PACs he is involved in show money being transferred into a "new loan account". What is that account used for?

The other question is who contributed these large sums of money to Bradley's PACs? As is the case with the expenditures, the contributor list is limited to only a few entries.

The following is a list of some of Stephen Bradley's direct PACs and the activity documented through the Secretary of State open records:

Annual Reports 1/31/2007

HIGHLAND PAC
Form 1 Statement: 185,400.00 contributions
10,000.00 other sources
213,205.00 total expenditures
Form 5 Itemized Expenditures: 7.675.00

205,530.00 unaccounted for, non-itemized

HORIZON PAC
Form 1 Statement: 189,475.00 contributions
198,955.00 total expenditures
Form 5 Itemized Expenditures: 13,000.00

176,475.00 unaccounted for, non-itemized

VPAC (contributed to Al LaPierre MASSEY PAC)
Form 1 Statement: 255,550.00 contributions
1,000.00 other sources
282,404.00 total expenditures
Form 5: Itemized Expenditures: 14,250.00

268,154.00 unaccounted for, non-itemized

ALA BIZ PAC
Form 1 Statement: 162,500.00
186,155.00 total expenditures
Form 5: Itemized Expenditures: 20,075.00

165,080.00 unaccounted for, non-itemized

BESPAC
Form 1 Statement: 191,200.00
199,555.00 total expenditures
Form 5: Itemized Expenditures: 18,075.00

173,125.00 unaccounted for, non itemized


A total of 988,364.00 is unaccounted for. Where did almost one million dollars go? Who did it go to?

Some of these PACs did have beginning balances that are not figured here because the amounts were low and not significant to greatly affect the unaccounted for figures.

The Campaign Finance Reform Act does require itemization of all sources and recipients, but the Secretary of State's office is asleep at the switch and does not apply the law. It has become a "clearing house" rather than an effective agency and must be changed.

Shelby County Commissioners running (and elected) for office 2008:

District 1: Corley Ellis
District 2: Tommy Edwards
District 3: Jon Parker
District 4: Daniel Acker
District 5: Joel Bearden
District 6: Larry Dillard
District 7: Lindsey Allison
District 8: Rick Shepard
District 9: Robbie Hayes

Vincent Mayor and City Council 2008 candidates (and elected) 2008:

Ray McAllister: Mayor
Bridgette Jordan-Smith: City Council
Ernest Kidd: ran for Mayor, then City Council
Larry King: City Council

The remaining 2 were already in place according to our sources.
*(If this in error please report).

We challenge every one of these officials to release their complete campaign records, fully itemized, to the public. Your *meeting records and official notes would be interesting to see as well.
*This request was made of Shelby County Planner Kristen Goddard through the FOIA, she released sketchy and selective records in our opinion, that showed only two meetings with Fowler & Bradley. Requests for the same records of Alex Dudchock, Joel Bearden and Corley Ellis have yet to be answered. The Vincent officials have been equally unresponsive to formal FOIA requests.

We also challenge Mr. Bradley to account for all of this money and the recipients as he was required to do by law but failed to do.

* Note: Al LaPierre as the readers may know, was involved in the corruption of Larry Langford. He received 48 months in prison from his role in the scandal.

Enter another "player" tied to all of these men; Malcolm Pirnie, who "steered" a million dollar plus lucrative contract to his friend at the EMC, Scott Phillips (who serves on the board of the EMC which oversees ADEM), in the Jefferson County SWMA incident, which BARD & Bradley played a large role in.
(See the links to right; "JeffCo Will Stay Out of SWMA" & "Petition to Remove ADEMs Water Permitting Authority")

*From one of the above two articles: "The plan calls for Jefferson County to outsource the actual testing and monitoring procedures. The city of Birmingham, one of several municipalities to leave SWMA in recent months, contracted with environmental engineering firm Malcolm Pirnie to train its workers to test and monitor storm water and construction run-off and report results to the Alabama Department of Environmental Management. Malcolm Pirnie’s Director of International Operations, Scott Phillips, serves on the Alabama Environmental Management Commission, which oversees ADEM".

Additional link and note reader's comments on BARD involvement following the story: 
Archiblog 2008 

ADEM & the EMC are Vincent's last line of defense in stopping the quarry.

When you consider all the different pieces of this puzzle, and how they fit together in the overall picture, one can begin to see why we are very concerned about the process of this quarry in Vincent, because of who is involved in it and the controversial history that follows them.