The afternoon of March 10, 2006, was one of the most chaotic ever seen in the office of the Ventura County Elections Division. Earlier that day, Rep. Elton Gallegly had visited former Ventura County Star Editor Joe Howry and dropped this bombshell: He intended to retire.

The deadline to file declarations of candidacy for the office was 5 p.m., and Gallegly's announcement set off a wild scramble. Former Assemblywoman Audra Strickland was at the counter asking about candidacy forms, first for her husband, Tony, and then for herself.

When the dust had settled, none of it mattered. All three politicians had already filed declarations of candidacy -- Gallegly for Congress, Audra Strickland for Assembly and Tony Strickland for controller -- and as all three found out, those declarations, once submitted, cannot be withdrawn.

Gallegly, after receiving medical assurances that the health issue that prompted his aborted retirement was not serious, changed his mind, ran after all, and easily won re-election. The incident, however, prompted a change in elections law. The following year the Legislature passed a bill -- known in some quarters as "Elton's Law" -- that added Congress to the list of offices for which an automatic filing extension is granted if a "qualified incumbent" does not file for re-election. The law is designed to prevent shananigans that would allow an incumbent to secretly decide to retire then hand-pick a successor who could file at the last minute, shutting out any other potential challengers.

Fast forward to 2011, and Gallegly once again is being coy about his intentions. It is highly unlikely that anything resembling 2006 will happen again. After all, there are still more than four months before the filing period closes at 5 p.m. on March 9 ... or does it?

Given that Gallegly lives just outside the boundary of the new 26th Congressional District, is he an "eligible incumbent"? And if he chose not to file, would the deadline be extended?

I asked at the county Registrar of Elections Office and at the Secretary of State's Office, and I'm still not certain I have an answer.

The Elections Code does have a section that deals with defining incumbents in the first election cycle after redistricting when the answer to such a seemingly simple question is not evident.

My reading of the code -- and I am certainly not a lawyer -- is that, by legal definition, the incumbent in the district is the member of Congress who represents the current 26th District, in the San Gabriel Valley. His name is David Dreier, and he has no intention of moving to or running in Ventura County.

We'll have to wait for the county registrar to sort it out, but it could well be the filing deadline will in fact be extended for five days because Dreier isn't running. If that's the case, Gallegly could wait until 5 p.m. on March 14 to make a decision.

As I say, it almost certainly won't come to that. But the potential for chaos exists again.

There is no California politician more adept than Sen. Tony Strickland of Moorparkl at tapping into obscure county party committees as a fund-raising vehicle. His latest coup, reported on Monday, was a $50,000 contribution from the Stanislaus County Republican Central Committee.

The website ElectionTrack.com reports that the contribution followed donations of a nearly identical amount to the Stanislaus County committee from entities associated with Farmers Insurance. Coincidentally, those contributions were made not long after Strickland had been credited with playing a key role in negotiating an end-of-session bill designed to smooth the way for construction of Farmers' Field, the proposed downtown Los Angeles football stadium to which Farmers Insurance Group has purchased the naming rights.

Under the state's campaign-finance laws, parties are exempt from contribution limits; they can give as much as they like to any candidate, and they can accept as much as they like from individual contributors.

County committees have thus become excellent vehicles for interest groups to make certain their favored candidates are well taken care of. Contributions made through party committees cannot be specifically earmarked for a given candidate, but there have been numerous instances in which the amounts coming in and the amounts going out are quite revealing. As a bonus for candidates and contributors alike, the reporting requirements for county committees are different from those for candidates, so they can be used by donors to hide their financial involvement until after an election is over.

A prime example took place in the 35th Assembly District in 2010, when GOP candidate Mike Stoker received $31,600 from the Ventura County Republican Central Committee in early November -- an amount that wasn't reported until January. That followed a $32,500 contribution to the county party on Sept. 21 from Greka Integrated, the Santa Maria-based oil company for which Stoker was a paid consultant. The company had been repeatedly cited for spills in Santa Barbara County, and Stoker's relationship with the firm had been a campaign issue raised by Democratic opponent Das Williams.

Strickland demonstrated his skill at working with county committees during his successful 2008 campaign. That year he took in more than $600,000 from eight different county committees, including those in Fresno, Monterey, Orange, Riverside, San Joaquin, Stanislaus, Ventura and Yolo. That was in addition to the $1.5 million he received from the state Republican Party.

As he gears up for what will likely be a very expensive 2012 campaign against Democratic Sen. Fran Pavley of Agoura Hills, it appears Strickland has already put his county committee machinery in gear.

Saturday was the deadline for candidates for federal offices to file campaign fundraising reports for the third quarter. Candidates for Congress often tout these reports to show off their fundraising prowress, to create buzz about their campaigns and scare off potential opponents. As a consequence, they try to make them seem as impressive as possible.

They go to great lengths to do so, and Exhibit A is the campaign of former state Sen. Abel Maldonado of Santa Maria, running as a Republican challenging incumbent Democrat Lois Capps of Santa Barbara in the new 24th Congressional District, which includes a small sliver of Ventura County, consisting of Ventura residents who live near the coast west of Seaward Avenue.

Maldonado reported cash on hand as of Sept. 30 of $603,769. But that total includes an on-again, off-again, on-again loan to himself of a quarter-million dollars. The money has been shuffled in and out of his campaign account to coincide with the reporting periods. On June 30, the final day of the second quarter, Maldonado made the $250,000 loan to the campaign. On July 1, the first day of third quarter, his campaign paid him back. Then on Sept. 30, the final day of the third quarter, a new quarter-million dollar loan was deposited in his campaign account.

We won't know until the middle of January what happened on Oct. 1.

Oxnard Harbor District Commissioner Jason Hodge received a boost today in his upstart campaign against former Assemblywoman Hannah-Beth Jackson of Santa Barbara in the 19th Senate District campaign.

The two Democrats will be seeking to be one of the top two finishers in the June 12 primary, the first that will be conducted under the new state system in which all voters can voter for candidates of any party. Under the new system, the primary will not select party nominees, and it is possible that both top finishers could be of the same party.

The 19th district includes all of western Ventura County and southern Santa Barbara County.

Hodge announced the endorsement of the Police Officers Research Association of California, the statewide umbrella organization of police officers' unions around the state. He had already received the backing of the Ventura County Deputy Sheriffs Association. Those endorsements give Hodge an impressive claim on law enforcement support in the upcoming support -- although the development was not unexpected, given that Hodge, a Ventura County firefighter, is a member of the fraternity of public safety employees.

"After years of working side by side with our police and sheriffs, I know the strength of law enforcement having my back," Hodge said in a press release announcing the PORAC endorsement.

PORAC has an independent expediture committee which spent more than $1.3 million in the 2010 election cycle. The committee had $100,000 in the bank at the end of June.

Jackson, meanwhile, has put together an impressive list of individual endorsers in both Santa Barbara County and in Hodge's home turf of Ventura County. Among the Ventura County elected officials who have signed on in support of Jackson are Oxnard council members Carmen Ramirez and Irene Pinkard; Ventura council members Mike Tracy and Brian Brennan; and Ventura Unified School Board members Debbie Golden, Velma Lomax, Barbara Fitzgerald and Mary Haffner.

With Supervisor Steve Bennett still not tipping his hand on whether he intends to run as a Democrat in the new 26th Congressional District, Assemblywoman Julia Brownley told me yesterday she is still considering a potential candidacy.

Two Democrats -- Moorpark City Councilman David Pollock and Westlake Village businessman and tennis instructor David Cruz Thayne -- have already announced their intention to run, but some party leaders are hoping that a candidate with both a higher profile and proven fund-raising ability will step forward. For the moment, that hope is focused on Bennett.

Brownley indicated that if Bennett opts out, she is still considering the race. Although she lives outside the district, in Santa Monica, her current Assembly district includes significant portions of the new congressional district, including Westlake Village, Port Hueneme and about half of Oxnard.

Bennett's indecision is delaying the day when he or another candidate, perhaps Brownley, can begin raising money and organizing a campaign. That is particularly important because of the possibility that Rep. Elton Gallegly, who has more than $800,000 in his campaign account, will run as a Republican in what, on paper, seems to be an ultra-competitive district in which either party's candidate could win.

Meanwhile, we'll find out next week how Pollock and Thayne have fared in their early fundraising. The quarterly reports are due on Monday. Thayne has given the appearance of some fundraising success, having hired top Democratic strategist Garry South to manage his campaign and also brought on a leading Democratic polling firm, Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz & Associates.