The bills within the audit reviews of Boston Metropolis Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson’s marketing campaign committee could possibly be mistaken for a big household bank card invoice: $1,630.65 at a BJ’s Wholesale Membership; $17 at Taco Bell; $410 at Restaurante Cesaria in Dorchester.
The state Workplace of Marketing campaign and Political Finance flagged these bills and quite a few others, saying they wanted extra documentation. The councilor ultimately complied — saying the BJ’s groceries in June of 2023 have been for a migrant meals drive. However Fernandes Anderson has almost 70 audit letters and evaluations in her file going again to 2021, excess of is typical, in response to specialists in marketing campaign finance. Most of the letters repeat prior requests that had gone unanswered.
Public data reviewed by WBUR painting a metropolis councilor who has confronted years of monetary turmoil. That pressure seeped into her political life, with shoddy recordkeeping, rule violations and the involvement of household in her monetary affairs, allegedly culminating in a money fee that prosecutors say was unlawful.
Fernandes Anderson was arrested on a half-dozen federal corruption prices earlier this month. Prosecutors allege that on June 9, 2023, sooner or later after the journey to Taco Bell, Fernandes Anderson took a $7,000 money kickback from a staffer in a Metropolis Corridor lavatory.
The councilor employed the kickback scheme at a time when she was attempting to repay money owed, the indictment alleges. However slightly than discover a authorized means to provide you with funds, she “selected to violate her fiduciary responsibility and defraud the town of Boston,” U.S. Legal professional for Massachusetts Joshua Levy mentioned. Fernandes Anderson has pleaded not responsible.
As not too long ago as final month, Fernandes Anderson was working to resolve marketing campaign finance infractions with state regulators.
In Massachusetts, public officers can use the money from their marketing campaign funds on something that enhances their “political future” and isn’t “primarily for private use.” There are specific reporting necessities, and in Fernandes Anderson’s case, it seems she was typically delinquent.
There have been funds filed with lacking particulars: $500 for a youth canvasser whose identify was illegible; $35 to a person for an unclear purpose; a $100 “donation” to an individual whose identify was unclear. There have been giant purchases with out rationalization at Walgreen’s, Cease & Store and Goal.
“It is placing, significantly in Massachusetts, the place the foundations are pretty weak, that she felt that she did not even must hassle to provide any type of rationalization,” mentioned Daniel Weiner, director of the elections and authorities program at NYU’s Brennan Heart for Justice. “In reality, there is likely to be a believable connection for a few of these purchases.”
Fernandes Anderson had entrusted her marketing campaign finance account to her 25-year-old son, Louis Roca, who she says is serving within the U.S. Marines. She named him treasurer in Might 2023. That was after she needed to fireplace him as a council staffer the prior yr, as a result of using her son and sister on her workers broke the state conflict-of-interest legislation.
Fernandes Anderson was fined $5,000 by the State Ethics fee in July 2023 for these violations.
Roca’s identify is on a variety of the audit letters. After months of lacking deposit reviews and expenditure data, state regulators ordered the councilor to take away him from that place too, in response to a decision letter filed in November.
Fernandes Anderson declined to reply particular questions for this story by way of her lawyer, Scott Lauer.
“We’ll reply to the allegations towards her on the applicable time and place,” Lauer mentioned in a press release. “Till then, we hope that the general public will respect the presumption of innocence and chorus from dashing to judgment till all of the details are recognized.”
Roca couldn’t be reached for remark.
In courtroom paperwork, federal investigators say the councilor was in a deep monetary bind in early to mid 2023. Fernandes Anderson earns a $115,000 annual wage as a metropolis councilor, but prosecutors allege she was lacking lease and automobile funds, and incurring financial institution overdraft charges due to low each day financial institution balances.
In public data, and by her personal official telling, there have been many lean years earlier than being elected councilor in 2021.
Fernandes Anderson’s childhood was marked by poverty and instability. In response to her metropolis council bio, she moved to the USA from Cape Verde at age 10, to dwell along with her mom in a Roxbury public housing venture. She recalled her first encounter with metropolis authorities got here when she was 12, after she helped emergency ship her aunt’s child at residence. She obtained an award from then-Mayor Ray Flynn.
Fernandes Anderson graduated from the John D. O’Bryant Excessive Faculty of Arithmetic and Science and attended Springfield School. She grew up as an undocumented immigrant, and have become a naturalized citizen in 2019.
In 2013, she based Noah’s Advocate, a psychological well being supplier. Filings with the Secretary of State’s workplace present the enterprise was dissolved in 2017.
Fernandes Anderson was government director of Bowdoin/Geneva Important Streets for 2 years earlier than she was elected, a nonprofit that helps small companies within the Dorchester neighborhood. She collected a modest wage — the nonprofit’s tax filings present she made about $36,875 a yr.
Within the federal indictment, prosecutors highlighted the $5,000 ethics advantageous they allege she was struggling to pay. However there look like different private money owed as properly. In 2018, a debt collector filed a criticism in Boston municipal courtroom, alleging Fernandes Anderson defaulted on a $10,500 mortgage and nonetheless owed greater than $8,300.
The councilor additionally owes $19,000 on a $35,000 mortgage to what seems to be a scholar mortgage supplier, in response to the councilor’s 2023 monetary disclosure filed with the Boston Metropolis Clerk. She writes within the disclosure that she’s in a fee deferral program. She doesn’t checklist any property.
Fernandes Anderson has mentioned she raised her two sons, in addition to over a dozen foster youngsters, as a single mom. Her husband, Tanzerius Anderson, is incarcerated on a life sentence, after being convicted of a Brighton homicide in 2002.
Successful a Metropolis Council seat in 2021 gave Fernandes Anderson entry to a six-figure wage and to marketing campaign funds which are evenly regulated. A recurring quip in Massachusetts political circles is that fundraising accounts of public officers are sometimes used as “private slush funds.”
But it surely seems Fernandes Anderson performed significantly quick and free, from the mounting audits to the hiring of her son.
“That type of nepotism is definitely pretty frequent, all the best way up, clearly, to presidential campaigns,” mentioned Weiner, the Brennan Heart marketing campaign finance professional. However, he famous, “Years of non-compliance is uncommon.”
Weiner mentioned Massachusetts has comparatively toothless marketing campaign finance legal guidelines. In different states, he mentioned, “a regulator at that time would hopefully have the authority and inclination to take extra critical motion.”
Fernandes Anderson resolved her marketing campaign finance compliance points in an settlement with state officers in November. She filed almost $33,000 of late deposit reviews, purged $1,750 in extra contributions, and agreed to take away her son from the marketing campaign committee.
However a lot greater authorized troubles are solely simply starting for her. And so they come at a value.
Fernandes Anderson obtained illustration within the federal case from Lauer, a public defender, at her first courtroom look. However the choose later dominated she should cowl a part of the price of her protection — and ordered her to pay $5,000 by subsequent month.
Jacquetta Van Zandt is a Boston political analyst who hosts a video podcast referred to as “Politics and Prosecco.” She’s additionally a home-owner in Fernandes Anderson’s district, and has recognized her since highschool. She mentioned she was “shocked” by the kickback allegations, particularly after the councilor was already below scrutiny for marketing campaign finance and ethics violations.
“My trustworthy take is, she had all of the alternatives to achieve success as a metropolis councilor and she or he selected to make many selections that might have penalties that might be not solely detrimental to her profession, however detrimental to that district,” Van Zandt mentioned.
Fernandes Anderson is going through calls to resign from Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, Metropolis Council President Ruthzee Louijeune, and a number of fellow councilors. Metropolis Councilor Ed Flynn has proposed making a council ethics committee, to “guarantee that we’ll be in compliance and know what the foundations and legal guidelines are.”
Thus far, Fernandes Anderson says she has no plans to step down. In an interview, she mentioned she is not taking her colleagues’ public feedback personally.
“Politics is attention-grabbing,” she mentioned. “Folks will apologize behind the scenes, and I say ‘That’s OK, I forgive you, be affected person, enable due course of.’”
She obtained some heat greetings from supporters at her first public assembly after being arrested and chatted amicably with colleagues.
Imam Abdullah Faaruuq, of Roxbury, was amongst these supporting her. He mentioned he is recognized Fernandes Anderson for 20 years and believes she fights arduous for the neighborhoods she represents.
“She nonetheless has work to do,” he mentioned. “She’s involved with the problems of concern for the folks of Roxbury specifically.”
However different constituents are dissatisfied. As her former classmate Van Zandt sees it, “She simply did not play the sport proper.”
