LA councilmen fined over free award show tickets

[April 09, 2011]  LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Four City Council members agreed to pay $13,300 in fines for improperly accepting free tickets to Hollywood shows and dinners, including the Academy Awards.

The city Ethics Commission, which issued a report on the fines Friday, is scheduled to vote Tuesday on whether to accept deals with Tony Cardenas, Eric Garcetti, Jose Huizar and Herb Wesson.

City law prohibited them from accepting gifts worth more than $100 a year from donors that have business before the city.

Garcetti agreed to pay the largest fine -- $4,800 -- for alleged violations that included accepting tickets to the Governors Ball that accompanied the 2007 Oscars and Emmys.

Garcetti said he believed that he was paying the full value of the tickets at the time, according to the report.

"While I paid the full cost of the award show tickets, I messed up when it came to the dinners afterward," Garcetti said in a statement. "That's my mistake."

The other council members agreed to pay lesser fines for accepting tickets to the Oscars, Emmys and BET Awards.

Ticket donors also have agreed to pay fines.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which produces the Oscars, agreed to pay $13,250, and the Emmy-producing Academy of Television Arts and Sciences is set to pay $7,900. The Recording Academy, which produces the Grammys, will pay $8,300.

Black Entertainment Television Networks, which stages the BET Awards, and theater and arena owner AEG agreed to smaller fines.

Last week, state and city ethics officials announced that Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa had agreed to pay nearly $42,000 in fines for failing to disclose that he received free tickets to Los Angeles Lakers games, the finals of "American Idol" and more than two dozen other sports and entertainment events.

The California Fair Political Practices Commission will vote Monday on whether to accept its share of the fine, which is considered to be the largest of its kind by the commission. The city Ethics Commission will vote on its share Tuesday.

[Associated Press]

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