Finance report shows two fund BR Tea Party

• By GREG GARLAND
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Nov 6, 2009 - Page: 3B

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Baton Rouge Tea Party LLC reported collecting $10,266 in contributions between Oct. 6 and Oct. 23 for its campaign to defeat a $901 million tax package on the Nov. 14 ballot, according to campaign-finance reports released Thursday.

The money the group raised is a fraction of the $439,280 raised so far this year by a political action committee promoting the tax.

Baton Rouge Tea Party President Jennifer Madsen said the group is relying on grass-roots volunteers to defeat the tax.

“We’re an organization built on the strength of our volunteers,” Madsen said. “It’s about getting people in their community.”

The Baton Rouge Tea Party got almost all of its money from two contributors.

Front Row LLC, 8090 Essen Cove Drive, contributed $5,000, as did Timothy Furnish, 3038 Silver Sands Drive, according to the campaign finance filing.

Records filed with the Louisiana Secretary of State’s Office list the officers of Front Row LLC as Robert L. Breaux Jr., and Glenn A. Rivette, both of Baton Rouge, and Ronald G. Breaux Sr., of St. Gabriel.

The Baton Rouge Tea Party reported spending $2,270 during the reporting period.

The largest expenditure was $1,897 to rent a meeting room at the Marriott Hotel for an anti-tax rally.

The group’s filing shows Baton Rouge Tea Party LLC was incorporated in Plaquemine, where Madsen resides.

Plaquemine is in Iberville Parish.

“It was a matter of convenience to incorporate it in Plaquemine, where I reside,” Madsen said.

She said 84 percent of the Baton Rouge Tea Party’s members live in East Baton Rouge Parish and that she is the only board member who doesn’t reside in East Baton Rouge Parish.