{"id":56829,"date":"2025-11-22T17:22:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-22T17:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/56829\/"},"modified":"2025-11-22T17:22:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-22T17:22:08","slug":"paula-stark-loses-her-political-committee-over-unpaid-16000-fines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/56829\/","title":{"rendered":"Paula Stark loses her political committee over unpaid $16,000 fines"},"content":{"rendered":"

The state has shut down Rep. Paula Stark\u2019s<\/a> long troubled political committee for not paying $16,225 in fines for missing a string of campaign finance deadlines in 2023, records show.<\/p>\n

The Florida Department of State\u2019s Elections Division sent a Nov. 6 final order<\/a> to revoke the registration for Friends of Paula<\/a>. The state could file a complaint in circuit court to fight for the fines and recoup attorney fees, according to an Oct. 22 letter<\/a> sent to Joel Davis, Stark\u2019s boyfriend who chairs Friends of Paula.<\/p>\n

Stark and Davis did not respond to a request for comment Friday for this story.<\/p>\n

The political committee, which is operating $10,000 in the red, has reported questionable expenses<\/a> for years on large restaurant bills and more recently for $953 at a St. Cloud car mechanic<\/a>.<\/p>\n

How the fines accrued was the political committee filed its M3 campaign treasurer\u2019s report 204 days late in 2023 which led to a $11,000 fine, according to the statement of facts from the final order.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Davis appealed and argued \u201cstaffing change and the death of a key employee resulted in the failure to file the required reports,\u201d according to the records. \u201cOnce Mr. Davis became aware of the oversight, he implemented internal controls and made sure all outstanding reports were brought up to date. New internal controls include checklists, written processes and appointing his personal executive assistant with direct authority to oversee the filing of the reports.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the state didn\u2019t buy it, and the Florida Election Commission upheld the $11,000 fine.<\/p>\n

The records said Davis\u2019 excuses \u201cdo not justify Respondent\u2019s failure to timely file the report.\u201d<\/p>\n

Davis, who did not attend the hearing, did not give any evidence or additional details to prove the employee\u2019s death, the staffing changes or \u201chow these circumstances directly resulted in Respondent\u2019s failure to file the 2023 M3 report,\u201d the final order said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Davis also missed more deadlines that year.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The 2023 M4 campaign treasurer\u2019s report was 173 days that year, resulting in a $1,121 fine. So was the 2023 M5 report \u2014 141 days late, costing $2,054 \u2014 as well as the 2023 M6 report \u2014 131 days late, a $2,049 fine.\u00a0<\/p>\n

By the Fall of 2025, the Friends of Paula was notified that the state was planning to cancel its registration, but the group did not respond or try to appeal, records said.<\/p>\n

Stark, who represents House District 47 that Democrats are eyeing to flip back, is already facing two candidates seeking to oust her.<\/p>\n

Jorge Figueroa, the President of the Puerto Rican Chamber of Commerce<\/a> of Central Florida and Anthony Nieves<\/a>, a former state investigator, have filed for the office.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The state has shut down Rep. Paula Stark\u2019s long troubled political committee for not paying $16,225 in fines…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":56830,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,35134,30,29,35135,35136,35137,35138,6484],"class_list":["post-56829","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-election-commission","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-friends-of-paula","tag-hd-47","tag-house-district-47","tag-joel-davis","tag-paula-stark"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56829","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56829"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56829\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}