(R-CA) Miller earmarks aided partner

[maddezmom]

Source: The Hill

By Susan Crabtree
May 03, 2007
Rep. Gary Miller (R-Calif.) helped secure several earmarks in the 2005 transportation bill that would benefit projects of his business partner, Lewis Operating, according to House sources and an analysis of the bill’s earmarks and San Bernardino County, Calif., land records.

In the years leading up to the bill’s passage, Miller’s financial ties to the company, one of the largest privately held real-estate development companies in the country, have grown. The year before the transportation bill passed, Miller borrowed $7.5 million from Lewis Operating to purchase land from it. Lewis Operating Corp. is also one of Miller’s top campaign contributors; employees of the company have donated $22,150 to Miller’s campaign committee since his election to Congress in 1998.

Miller also has partnered or been involved with a number of real-estate transactions with the company in the past five years, making $1.1 million to $6 million in profits from deals involving Lewis Operating in some part of the transaction, according to the lawmaker’s financial disclosure reports.

The FBI has been investigating several of Miller’s land deals, particularly the sale of 165 acres to the city of Monrovia in 2002. Miller made at least $10 million on the deal, but has faced scrutiny for avoiding paying capital gains taxes on the land by telling the IRS that the city had threatened to seize the land through eminent domain, and subsequently reinvesting the profit into land purchased from Lewis Operating.




Read more: http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/miller-earmarks-aided-partner-2007-05-02.html

[Elwood P Dowd]

1. What'$ with the$e Californicating republican$?

Tho$e family value$ repuke$ are $tuffing their pocket$ with million$ of U$ taxpayer'$ dollar$.