Mormons Agree to Prop. 8 Fine

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has agreed to pay a $5,539 fine after a complaint was sent to the California Fair Political Practices Committee outlining the church's failure to report nonmonetary donations to the Proposition 8 campaign in 2008.

Activist Fred Karger filed the report, which shows nearly $36,928 in unreported contributions. The original complaint claimed that the LDS (Mormon) Church failed to report hundreds of thousands of dollars that went Proposition 8 in California.

"All institutional contributions made by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to the Protect Marriage Coalition were reported to the appropriate authorities in California," LDS spokesman Scott Trotter told Salt Lake City's Deseret News."In the last two weeks leading up to the election, the Church mistakenly overlooked the daily reporting requirement and instead reported those contributions together in a later filing."

The fine is a mutually agreed-upon 15% of the full value of each unreported contribution.

The church reports its total contributions to the Yes on 8 campaign amounted to $189,903.58 in 2008, including monetary and in-kind contributions, such as video production, donated church employee time, and travel costs.