AUGUSTA — The Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices has voted to fine Patricia Jones of Mount Vernon, a former state representative who lost her re-election bid last November, for filing a monthly lobbyist report two days late. The fine is $100.

Commission staff recommended that Jones be fined for failure to file her first monthly lobbyist report after registering as a lobbyist for the Fryeburg-based Maine Dental Hygienists Association, of which she is a member, in December. The report was due to be filed by Jan. 18 but was filed two days late.

Jones had asked the commission for a waiver of the fine. She was new to the filing requirements for lobbyists and had difficulties accessing the online electronic reporting system, she said.

Commission staff, while sympathetic to Jones’ first-time filer status, recommended the commission deny the waiver and assess the $100 fine, which the commission did. The vote was last week.

In another matter concerning Jones, the commission voted not to seek reimbursement from the former legislator for funds used to buy a plane ticket for her son.

Jones, a Democrat who served a two-year term in the House beginning in 2008, lost her re-election bid in District 83 to Republican Dennis Keschl of Belgrade last November. During that race, according to Jones’ Clean Election Fund expenditure report, she spent $395.80 on Oct. 7 to buy a US Airways ticket for her son to fly from Chicago to Maine to work on her campaign.

Ethics commission staff had recommended that she be required to repay that expenditure, but the commission voted that the expenditure was campaign-related and did not have to be repaid.

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