Sonoma County Supervisor James Gore fined for violating state income disclosure rules

Sonoma County Supervisor James Gore violated state regulations over a four-year period by not disclosing his wife’s business on his economic interest statements, the state’s campaign finance and government ethics watchdog has found.

Gore, who is running for a third term on the Board of Supervisors, paid a $400 penalty to the Fair Political Practices Commission for not disclosing as an income source his wife’s company, Hello Alice, an A.I.-based digital adviser for business owners.

The omissions were on mandatory economic interest forms filed by Gore from 2017 to 2020. The state charged him $100 per year for the violations.

Gore’s wife, Elizabeth Gore, is the company’s president and co-founder.

The commission’s decision lists the violation as failure to “timely report a source of income” on annual statements of economic interests.

Gore’s filings, which the supervisor provided to The Press Democrat, show he listed his wife’s income as over $100,000 but did not specify its source, Hello Alice. Additionally, Gore’s economic interest form, known as a Form 700, for 2019 was missing the entire page used to list income.

Gore, the Board of Supervisors chair, called the omissions a “clerical error.”

“Form 700s are documents that you try to improve upon every year,” Gore said.

Gore, a former Obama administration appointee and immediate past president of the California State Assocation of Counties, is running to be the second vice president of the National Assocation of Counties, the lead entity representing county governments at the federal level.

Elected officials in California are required to submit a Form 700 declaring their personal financial interests to ensure accountability and identify potential conflicts of interest. They are also required to disclose their spouse’s incomes, investments and interests in real property.

“He wouldn’t have to disclose a sister’s income, for example, or an adult child’s income because he doesn’t have any interest in that,” said Bob Stern, the principal co-author of the Political Reform Act, which governs California campaign finance and government ethics.

Stern said he did not think Gore’s violation was major, noting it was an administrative penalty, “not criminal.”

“Most people comply with the law, most people are not fined, so it’s not common but it’s not egregious,” Stern said. “It’s not something that people should be overly concerned about. Obviously he should have listed it, there’s no question about that.”

In his filings for 2016 through 2020, Gore listed his other interests as his family’s wine business, Gore Family Vineyards, from which he consistently reported receiving $0 to $499 in gross income.

In his filing for 2016, Gore also listed Thomas A. Gore Vineyard Trust as a business interest, for which he reported a $10,001 to $100,000 income, and a $50,000 single source income payment.

This is the second time in eight years that Gore has been fined for a campaign finance violation.

During his first bid for supervisor in 2014, Gore failed to timely report unpaid campaign bills, totaling $30,000, for work performed by his chief campaign strategist, Rob Muelrath of Santa Rosa. Gore formally accepted responsibility for those violations and agreed to pay a $2,000 fine to the state.

The latest penalty from the state elections watchdog came down in February, after a Sonoma County resident filed a complaint against Gore on behalf of a neighborhood group for what they alleged was a conflict of interest violation.

The complaint, filed in October 2021, accused Gore of not disclosing a conflict of interest, because his sister-in-law, Erin Gore, has a cannabis manufacturing and distribution business in Cloverdale, which was included on Hello Alice’s platform.

“Sonoma County Supervisor James Gore should recuse himself from voting on any cannabis policies,” the complaint read.

Sebastopol resident Marshall Behling filed the complaint on behalf of the Neighborhood Coalition Sonoma County, which opposes the expansion of commercial cannabis operations.

The Board of Supervisors has grappled with the county’s cumbersome cannabis regulations for years. While cultivators and industry experts say the county’s policies are unfairly burdensome, residents have called for more stringent oversight, citing concerns over safety, water use and other neighborhood impacts.

In its review of the complaint, the state elections watchdog found there was no conflict of interest violation, no intent to conceal and the extent of public harm “was not more than minimal.”

Gore, in an interview, acknowledged that after two terms as supervisor he has years of experience filling out form 700s.

“Yes, but you make mistakes, you get busy, you’re in the middle of the pandemic,” Gore said. “Take a look at it. It’s like a tax document, it’s not a simple damn document.”

Referring to the conflict of interest accusations over his sister-in-law’s cannabis business, Gore added, “There’s no malintent, there’s no economic benefit, there’s no there there.”

You can reach Staff Writer Emma Murphy at 707-521-5228 or emma.murphy@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @MurphReports.