E-Mail This Article to a Friend CAMPAIGN EXPENSES The Romney campaign never ends BY DAVID S. BERNSTEIN

The Romney for Governor Committee — the official campaign organization of Mitt Romney — kept on rolling last year, even though Romney’s successful gubernatorial campaign had ended. The committee took in just over $1.5 million in contributions in 2003, and spent $821,391.44.

So how did the campaign committee manage to spend $820,000 without a campaign to worry about until November 2006? Well, you gotta spend money to make money. "The cost of fundraising is where most of our money went," says Alex Dunn, Romney’s deputy chief of staff, who heads the committee.

Here’s a rough estimate of where that $820,000 went, based on the newly filed 2003 committee-expenditure report.

General expenses: $260,000. This includes taxes, insurance, bank fees, computers, and utilities. But much of this money has gone into the new Massachusetts Republican Party offices at 85 Merrimac Street, which opened in March. To help the party afford the new digs, Romney moved political staffer Alex Dunn’s office there, so the governor’s committee could cover most of the operating expenses.

Printing and mailing: $200,000. It costs a lot to invite people to fundraisers.

Food and entertainment: $130,000. You can’t fundraise without food and drink. One highlight: a $12,859 tab at the Venus de Milo restaurant in Swansea for an event in July. But the big blowout came on December 23 at the Seaport Hotel, for several hundred Romney supporters, Dunn says. The committee paid the Seaport $25,000, but there was also $735 for a photographer and $5900 for the band Brandy ("Not just a band — an experience!", according to their Web site). This category, by the way, also includes various gifts for supporters, such as Red Sox tickets, unspecified items from Shreve, Crump & Low, and numerous flower deliveries.

Salaries: $120,000. This includes about $31,000 for Dunn, $46,500 for finance director Michelle Bernstein, and $20,000 for Taggart Romney, the governor’s son. "He stayed on for a few months to get things in order" after the election, says Dunn. "Just at the beginning of the year, through the transition." In fact, Taggart received a regular check, for more than $1500 per month, through September — 10 months after the election.

Political consulting: $70,000. Romney uses some of the best in the business. He paid $15,000 last year to Gray Media in Boston, led by GOP heavy hitter Robert Gray ("He is a very impressive guy," says Karl Rove in a quote on Gray’s Web site). Another $43,000 went to Murphy Pintak Gautier Hudome Agency in Falls Church, Virginia, headed by the ubiquitous Michael Murphy ("The GOP’s hottest media consultant," according to a Newsweek quote on Murphy’s site).

Travel: $20,000. The committee pays for staff travel and, of course, the governor’s political trips.

Reimbursements, loose change, etc.: $20,000. In the confusing world of campaign-finance law, contributors often screw up and go over their limits. The campaign committee then has to refund the money. Henry Kissinger, it turns out, over-donated by $500 and had to take back the overage.

One last note: the committee ended 2003 with $727,666.89 in cash on hand, after beginning the year with less than $50,000. So apparently all this spending paid off.