Prinzivalli Gets Help From Marlborough Republican City Committee

TEWKSBURY, MA -- Among the $4,154 in in-kind donations Pina Prinzivalli when she submitted campaign finance reports on Monday were more than $2,700 from the Marlborough Republican City Committee. The group helped the lone Republican candidate for the 19th Middlesex District seat in the State House of Representatives with canvasing, postage and "field assistance."

Prinzivalli also received a direct contribution of $1,000 from the group. While the local committees tend to focus on local races, the Marlborough Republican City Committee has increasingly spread money across the state to help GOP candidates in state representative and state senate races. Between the start of the year and August 17, the last date covered by pre-primary reports that were due on Monday, the Marlborough Republican City Committee has doled out more than $83,000 in in-kind contributions to Republican candidates.

A spokesperson for Prinzivalli said Monday morning that a press release on the Marlborough Republican City Club was "forthcoming." The release did not, however, address the support she got from the group.

Beginning in 2010, the Marlborough group started to focus its efforts on drawing donations from outside the region. Already this year the group has raised more than $83,000 which it has passed out Republican candidates like Prinzivalli. Most of that has been in the form of campaign support. In 2014, for example, the group back 30 candidates in races for the state legislature, and much of the support was in the for of payments of $50 and $75 to canvassers.

In 2012, the Massachusetts Democratic Party called for a state investigation of the Marlborough Republican City Committee. Democrats claimed that Paul Adams, a state rep from Andover, had family members donate $30,000 to the Marlborough Republican City Committee. The group then spent $27,806.31 to make anonymous mailings supporting Adams.

The move was seen as a way to circumvent campaign finance rules, which cap individual contributions to a candidate at $500. But individuals can make in-kind gifts, and there are no caps on the gifts they can make to political action committees like the Marlborough Republican City Committee.

State campaign finance records do not show any donations from Prinzivalli or her family members to the Marlborough Republican City Committee.

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Patch file photo.

Dave Copeland can be reached at dave.copeland@patch.com or by calling 617-433-7851. Follow him on Twitter (@CopeWrites) and Facebook (/copewrites).