An Anchorage financial manager and three groups accused of breaking the law during last year’s campaign to block the massive Pebble mine prospect said this week they are innocent and that mining companies are just trying to smear them.

In late March, the two companies trying to develop the proposed copper and gold mine and the Resource Development Council, an Anchorage business group, filed a complaint with election regulators accusing the financier, Bob Gillam, and the advocacy groups of illegally hiding nearly $2 million of donations from Gillam to the anti-Pebble campaign.

Legal responses by Gillam, the Renewable Resources Coalition, Alaskans for Clean Water and Americans for Job Security, say the money he provided to them during last year’s multimillion-dollar fight over Ballot Measure 4, the “Clean Water” initiative, did not break any laws.

Most of the allegations lack legal foundation, deliberately misrepresent facts or lack evidence to back them up, Gillam and two of the groups said in their filing to the Alaska Public Offices Commission.

“The fact that Pebble has nonetheless filed such allegations … is a reflection of its true motive to smear (its opponents),” the filing said.

Measure 4, rejected by voters in August, was an attempt by Pebble opponents to require stricter limits on water-pollution discharges from large mines.

If developed, Pebble would be the largest mine in Alaska and one of the largest copper-gold mines in the world.

Pebble opponents have been waging a high-profile advertising and lobbying campaign against the proposed mine in Southwest Alaska for several years. The proposed mine is controversial due to its location in the headwaters of two of the five rivers that feed Bristol Bay’s world-class salmon runs.

Gillam, an avid fisherman who owns a large home on Lake Clark near the Pebble prospect, has helped bankroll the opponents’ campaign.

CAMPAIGN MILLIONS

The crux of Pebble’s accusations is that Gillam secretly gave nearly $2 million to the Anchorage-based Renewable Resources Coalition and the Virginia-based Americans for Job Security, which then funneled the money to a pro-Measure 4 ballot measure group, Alaskans for Clean Water, to help pay for the campaign.

The donations to the groups were an illegal “pass through,” according to Pebble. They based their 16-page accusation — plus hundreds of pages of exhibits — on e-mail exchanges between Gillam and the groups before, during and after the ballot measure campaign.

In a 52-page filing, Gillam and the groups said the money he provided to Americans for Job Security and the Renewable Resources Coalition did not come with strings attached — they did not have to be used for Measure 4 — and the groups’ use of the money for the political campaign did not break any laws.

The Renewable Resources Coalition, a non-profit founded in 2005 to fight Pebble, says it has about 1,800 members, including commercial fishermen, lodge owners and Alaska Natives.

The Americans for Job Security is a national pro-business group that helped fund the Measure 4 campaign and ran ads against Pebble. The group, which often runs ads favoring Republican candidates in high-profile congressional races, typically refuses to identify its donors, stating that its money comes from member dues.

Gillam had been donating money to the Renewable Resources Coalition for several years; last June, he became a member of AJS, according to Gillam’s filing to the state public offices commission.

He did disclose donations of about $158,000 to election regulators for the Measure 4 campaign but claims the money he has given to the Renewable Resources Coalition and AJS does not have to be reported. The amount he has paid to AJS in member dues is unknown.

AJS and the Renewable Resources Coalition both reported to election regulators that they helped finance the Measure 4 campaign.

LEAKED E-MAILS

How did Pebble and the Resource Development Council get hold of Gillam’s e-mails?

The Pebble Partnership, made up of Canadian mining company Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. and London mining giant Anglo American, says it got the e-mails from Robert Kaplan, the California fundraiser who worked with the pro-Measure 4 groups.

But the day after Pebble filed the complaint, a representative from Kaplan’s company approached one of the pro-Measure 4 groups saying that he had not provided those documents to Pebble, this week’s legal filings say.

The documents may have been improperly leaked to Pebble by an unidentified local attorney who got them from Kaplan when he was involved in a financial dispute with the groups; sharing them with Pebble might have been a violation of attorney-client privilege, Gillam and the groups said.

APOC is investigating the Pebble complaint and has not scheduled hearings yet, said Holly Hill, the executive director.

State law allows APOC to assess a $50-per-day fine for any violation other than a late report.

-- Elizabeth Bluemink, ebluemink@adn.com