New York City Council Member Tony Avella plans to introduce a Clean Elections public financing bill that would cover city office campaigns in the near future. The bill builds on efforts to increase the influence of small donors begun with New York's 4-to-1 matching program for small dollar contributions.

Avella's bill, modeled on Clean Elections legislation in other states and cities, would require candidates to collect $5 qualifying contributions from New York city residents and agree to spending limits in exchange for which they would receive a grant to run their campaign.

While he said he has not yet determined the additional cost to the city, Mr. Avella said his plan would require more funds than the current system, which paid out $24 million in 2005 and $42 million in 2001 to finance campaigns. Mr. Avella said some of the cost would be made up by reducing the spending limits on candidates, which now range between $161,000 for council candidates and $6.16 million for a mayoral run.

"I don't think there's any need for the amount of money we're spending," he said. "All we're making happy is the consultants. What I would like to see is less money spent — then the people would have to do real work in their communities to get their name out."

Efforts are also underway to introduce Clean Elections legislation in Albany to cover state legislative races. New York Governor Eliot Spitzer (D) has made his support for full public financing of campaigns well known, raising the profile of the issue for the legislature.