No Refunds for Filner Recall Supporters

Organizer says roughly $100,000 has been collected to get the San Diego mayor out of office

The people who donated to the recall effort against San Diego Mayor Bob Filner will not see a refund even though the mayor is planning to resign this week.

Special Section: Mayor Under Fire


Recall organizer Rachel Laing said nobody will get money back if they donated to recall and The $100,000 collected has been used for volunteer infrastructure.

β€œThere's no pot of money laying around,” Laing said.

She also said volunteers will continue collecting signatures in case there’s a chance Filner chooses to go against the agreement he made with city leaders and not resign.

Filner was accused of sexually harassing multiple women in early July, and later attended a two-week intensive therapy program followed by a personal week off. Once he returned, he met with city leaders and eventually reached a deal with them to resign, pending approval from the city council.

Recall efforts sparked almost moments
after Filner was publicly accused of treating women inappropriately. Recall leaders Michael Pallamary, Elisa Brent, Stampp Corbin and John Cox worked to gather dozens of volunteers to collect signatures for the petition.

Organizers were joined by congressional candidate Carl DeMaio, who asked city leaders to join him in the recall effort.

A recall can be difficult to organize. Funding is also needed to support signature gathering and at least 101,000 signatures were needed by Sept. 26 to qualify for the ballot.

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