Politics and money go together like flies and honey; you can't have one without the other.

Legislators and lobbyists pushing a campaign finance reform bill dealt with the first pair, but felt like got stuck in the second on Wednesday.

"There has never been a campaign finance law - state or national - that there hasn't been a loophole," Sen. Grant Larson, R-Teton/Fremont, told the Joint Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Interim Committee.

The committee approved the bill on a 9-5 vote mostly along Republican-Democrat party lines, with those in favor calling it a step forward.

"It does show the intent of the Legislature that we're trying to do the best we can to keep elections fair and honest," Larson said.

Proponents of the bill wanted to close a loophole in the law revealed when Casper businessman Mick McMurry formed the Committee to Elect Natrona County Candidates and pumped more than $11,000 in it, with nearly all of it going to Republican Barb Peryam.

The PAC was legal.

State law prohibits individuals from donating more than $1,000 to a candidate for the primary election and $1,000 for the general election, but PACs can donate an unlimited amount to a candidate.

But the loophole allows PACs to give unlimited amounts of money to any single campaign, and could create a conduit for individual donations above the allowable limits, ESPC chairwoman Sarah Gorin told the Joint Corporations Committee.

The draft bill before the committee addressed some of those issues.

But Gorin unsuccessfully tried to persuade the committee to drop two provisions in the draft she said undermined the reform effort.

The draft bill raised campaign contribution limits from $1,000 per candidate per election to $3,500.

It also eliminated the existing $25,000 cap that an individual can contribute to candidates over the two-year election cycle.

Elections in Wyoming are not nearly as costly as in other states and contributors rarely give the full $1,000 allowable by law, Gorin said.

No single contributor has reached the $25,000 cap, either, she said. "In short, there is nothing broken here that needs fixing."

However, the higher $3,500 per candidate limit could entice candidates to seek donations from a few people with deep pockets - and narrow agendas - rather than appealing to more donors who would give less, Gorin said.

Larson disputed her assertions, saying people poured thousands of dollars into his opponents' coffers and media costs alone have skyrocketed in recent years.

Rep. Kermit Brown, R-Laramie, told Gorin he suggested the $3,500 limit because that's the result of calculating the inflation rate of the $1,000 figure set in campaign finance law in the early 1970s.

Besides the dollar amounts, the bill had another problem with an unenforceable provision about donors to PACs who designate their contributions to a particular candidate, said Dan Zwonitzer, R-Cheyenne. "People are going to find a way to get around it."

The new reporting requirements came under scrutiny, too.

Sen. Stan Cooper, R-Lincoln/Uinta/Sublette/Sweetwater, said many candidates conduct campaigns from their kitchen tables and don't have the resources to properly file certain donations in a short period before an election.

Likewise, Rep. Tom Walsh, R-Casper, said he favored the draft bill but wondered if the reporting requirements may dissuade well-meaning citizens in small towns from running for office. "We're getting way into the deep end of the red tape."

The committee approved the bill, despite reservations even from proponents.

"The public in general elects candidates who are good and honest," Cooper said. "We're still going to have people who are going to do something not proper."

Reach Tom Morton at (307) 266-0592, or at Tom.Morton@trib.com.