VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — A candidate running to be Virginia Beach’s next mayor is defending his use of campaign funds to take his family to Busch Gardens Williamsburg.

Councilman Chris Taylor spent $307 total with Sea World Parks & Entertainment LLC, the owners of the theme park, in July and August this year according to his latest campaign finance filing. The expenditures were made on four separate dates, with the first being on July 24 and the most recent on Aug. 28.

The report classified the expenses simply as “advertising.”

However, Taylor confirms, the money bought tickets to the park.

“We have three huge attractions and amusements in the State of Virginia,” Taylor said. “Our aquarium is the third most visited, Kings Dominion and Busch Gardens. What I did as a millennial, young, not someone who has been running the same campaign, was that we ordered baseball jerseys and uniforms that said ‘Chris Taylor’ on the front ’24 for mayor.'”

Taylor said he then proceeded to wear those campaign shirts while in the park, believing many Virginia Beach voters make the 50-mile trip to James City County.

“And so advertising, I went there to advertise to campaign and picked up at least 50 to 75 votes by wearing my Chris Taylor jersey,” Taylor said.

Family members also joined in, according to Taylor.

“I’ve gone by myself, I’ve gone with my family,” Taylor said. “My wife works with my campaign because its grassroots. … My wife does all my event planning. We have pictures of all of our events and where we go. Our kids are in CT for VB so we working. There is no difference in (Rep.) Jen Kiggans hiring a bunch of high schoolers and giving them money. I just don’t have a million dollar budget.”

Taylor is in the middle of his first term on city council and one of five people running to be the city’s next mayor. He is joined by Councilwoman Sabrina Wooten, John Moss, a former council member and RK Kowalewitch, a businessman, in trying to unset incumbent Mayor Bobby Dyer, who is running for his second full term.

Taylor has raised roughly $30,000 in his campaign to be the next mayor, with Doug Davis, owner of DAVCON, Inc., an HVAC and plumbing business being the top contributor with $2,500. He has also received money from frequent Virginia Beach campaign contributors, such as developers McLeskey & Associates and Mike Sifen.

While all campaigns have spent money on items such as digital advertising and political signs, only Taylor reported itemized trips to places like Busch Gardens and Haygood Skating Center.

He is also not the only candidate running for mayor this cycle to expense individual meals and fuel costs. Taylor has spent upwards of $1,000 at Wawa stores.

Kowalewitch, who has run unsuccessfully for Virginia Beach City Council nine previous times, has also expensed individual meals in the past.

All of it is legal, as long as a candidate is running for a local or state office in Virginia.

“When we look at Virginia’s campaign finance laws and then the expenditure laws that we have in the states, they are fairly loose, they’re not very detailed and thus it leaves a lot of latitude for the candidates and their committees in terms of where the soliciting the money from and ultimately how they spend it,” said Dr. Ben Melusky, a political science professor at Old Dominion University.

Virginia is the only state where lawmakers can raise unlimited campaign donations from anyone, including corporations and unions, and spend the money on themselves according to the Associated Press. Federal candidates can find themselves criminally charged for doing such a thing.

Between 2011 and 2016, former State Sen. Lionell Spruill spent $300,000 from his campaign account on numerous luxuries: a membership in a private business club, meals at Ruth’s Chris steakhouses around the country, and more than $2,000 at high-end Richmond restaurants during legislative sessions.

While many lawmakers have full time jobs on top of their part-time elected office, Spruill, did not list an outside income.

Taylor was a partner in the local business, Smoothie Stop, but has closed the businesses to “focus on the campaign.”

Efforts to strengthen campaign finance laws in the Commonwealth have consistently failed in the Virginia General Assembly, with lawmakers providing a variety of reasons.

“So voters themselves need to be the ones to, one, either discern that information,” Melusky said, “or two, if that happens on a more kind of consistent scale across the state, maybe then it does create an appetite amongst the electorate and then of either legislators for campaign finance reform.”

CORRECTION: In an earlier version of this article a word was omitted that incorrectly identified Councilman Taylor as the only candidate expensing meals and fuel costs. WAVY-TV regrets the error.