Dear Mr. Ricchiazzi:
I read your website every day and love how you are exposing political corruption around Erie County and WNY. I am very bothered by Frank Max’s Progressive Democrats of WNY group and their lack of accountability and thought this would make for a great story.
Every political action committee (which the Progressive Democrats are), must periodically file financial disclosure reports with the NYS Board of Elections. You can check this out on the http://www.elections.ny.gov/ and click on “Campaign Finance” and then “View Disclosure Reports”.
If you search for Progressive Democrats of Western New York Filer ID C26203 and Click on their January Filing report it may not look like anything at first glance, but there is a big problem there. http://www.elections.ny.gov:8080/plsql_browser/getfiler2_loaddates
You see the Progressive Democrats of WNY had a big Christmas party on December 22, 2014 with approximately 150 people, yet there is no mention of that party on the January disclosure report. No income, no expenses nothing. I have attached a copy of the invitation for the December party, along with pictures of the disclosure reports showing a $2.00 balance.
Now I received an invitation to the Progressive Democrats Annual Brunch for this Saturday, April 18. One needs to ask what happened to the money from the December 2014 Christmas party and what will happen to the money from this Spring brunch?
Why does Max feel he does not need to report any of this fundraising income to the state?
Frank Max is breaking the law!!!!
One also needs to ask why would any candidate, especially those running for an Erie County Judge seat, want to be seen at this Spring Brunch? The guy is a criminal and pocketing this money.
There have been rumors circulating all across Erie County, that Max pockets a majority of the cash. We need people like you to expose the truth. Thank you for your excellent reporting!!!
John
