Election Board Member Should Resign

Months ago during the Election Board's first hearing on Matt Kelty's campaign finance violations, board member David Wright informed all those in attendance that it would be his final hearing because he would be stepping down. Wright then went on to embarrass himself and the sully the board's credibility by not asking a single substantive question during the hearing. Readers might remember that I rightly chastised the board at that time.

It was a pathetic display all around. The two Republican board members (Therese Brown and David Wright) asked ONE question between the two of them and Bopp didn't directly answer a SINGLE QUESTION from Andy Downs' (D) list.

Now we find out that special prosecutor Dan Sigler feels the same way I do:

In his response to a motion to dismiss Kelty’s charges, Sigler, a Democrat, wrote that the Republicans asked only one question before the board voted to find no violation.

Sigler wrote that the board disregarded its power to question witnesses under oath and its power of subpoena.

“The board ignored its investigative powers and had an absolute minimum invested in examining the defendant (Kelty’s) violations,” he wrote.

By contrast, Sigler said the grand jury met for more than a week and interviewed 15 witnesses and examined thousands of pages of bank records, e-mail and other documents.

The Election Board should certainly be embarrassed by their handling of the Kelty complaint. Andy Downs was the only member of the board that took that hearing seriously and actually tried to get answers out of the Kelty campaign. While his approach was ineffective, it should be noted that he was completely stonewalled by Jim Bopp with the help of the other two board members.

Andy Downs, Democratic member of the board, said all of Sigler’s assertions were accurate, noting he thought he asked several good questions that weren’t answered by Kelty or his attorney, Jim Bopp.

“We didn’t push the issue very far,” Downs said.

Instead of owning up for abdicating his duties as Board Member David Wright continues to make excuses and they're simply unconvincing:

David Wright, Republican member of the board, said he still doesn’t believe Kelty broke campaign finance law and felt the board did everything it was supposed to do.

“What does he (Sigler) expect us to do?” he said. “It’s not a grand jury. We don’t go out and investigate.”

Well that's true I suppose - this board certainly didn't go out and investigate. But I have news for Wright, something he should obviously know as a member of the Election Board, he can investigate. In fact it's spelled out right there for him in the Indiana Code:

IC 3-9-4-13
Audits; investigations
Sec. 13. The election division and each county election board shall make audits and field investigations from time to time with respect to reports and statements filed under this article and with respect to an alleged failure to file a report or statement required under this article. The election division may request the state board of accounts to assist in the performance of audits the election division considers necessary, and the state board of accounts may perform the audits that are requested.

It's time for some changes...

Election Board Hearing Coverage

I won't be able to attend the Election Board hearing about the unreported contribution from Dan Turkette to the Kelty for Mayor campaign. It would be great if another blogger/citizen that was there would post their thoughts on what transpires. If you don't have your own blog then e-mail me your comments and I'll be happy to post them later tonight...

The meeting will take place at 3pm in the City-County Building in the Commissioner's Conference room. That's the meeting room directly atop the escalators. Here's the official meeting notice that describes what's going to take place.

Does Anyone Take the Election Board Seriously?

My communications with the election board lead me to believe they are going to call Matt Kelty's failure to file a CFA-11 for Dan Turkette's contribution a "late filing". Give me a break. The only reason it was filed at all, 5 months late, is because I reported it missing. If one uses the election board's logic then the very act of identifying a report as missing would make it a "late" filing. In other words, there is no possible scenario that anyone could get in trouble for not filing a report.

When Robert Enders filed the LPAC report a few days after the deadline - that was a late filing. When a candidate indicted on 7 campaign finance related charges retroactively files a report after a citizen complaint - that is a failure to file. Is there any other board in all of Allen County that is as ineffective and in need of a complete overhaul than the Allen County Election Board?

Political Notebook Covers Kelty's Missing Campaign Finance Form

Today's Political Notebook section of the JG briefly discusses my letter to the election board regarding Matt Kelty's campaign finance violation:

The Allen County Election Board might meet again to talk about the campaign finances of Republican mayoral nominee Matt Kelty.

The board is investigating a complaint that Kelty failed to properly disclose a $1,000 donation before the primary election. Jeff Pruitt, an author of a local left-leaning blog, asked the board Monday to investigate Kelty for not reporting a $1,000 donation given by Dan Turkette, the author of a local right-leaning blog.

Kelty’s most recent campaign filing shows he received $1,000 from Turkette on May 3. State law requires candidates to report contributions $1,000 or larger received after the pre-primary deadline of April 13 and two days before the election of May 8. Kelty did report several other large donations before the primary. The reports are due within 48 hours of a candidate receiving it.

Kelty on Tuesday filed the proper form listing Turkette’s May contribution, although he dated it Oct. 4.

Andy Downs, Democratic election board member, said the matter will be investigated and could result in a fine of up to $100. The board previously agreed to more strictly enforce deadlines.

Readers could interpret this complaint as some blog-war between myself and Dan Turkette. That could not be further from the truth. While we don't agree on some issues we are respectful of one another and this complaint had nothing to do with Dan - it just so happened his contribution was the one that wasn't reported.

Let me just say that the election board should investigate the matter and not simply declare this a "late filing". This was not late - it was never filed at all. It would have never been filed had I not made this public. Let me try and break away from the current Kelty campaign finance issues and discuss the election board in general.

This board does a great disservice to all candidates when it refuses to adhere to state campaign finance laws. The board never fines candidates and thus nobody is ever held accountable. So when a major issue/complaint does come forward there is precedent for ignoring it and calling it business as usual. If you ignore the minor violations but try to clamp down on the major ones, someone will always claim they are the victim of a partisan witch hunt. My advice to the election board would be to enforce all laws and draft a set of written procedures that tell candidates when they will be fined and what that fine will be.

News Sentinel Covers Kelty's Missing Campaign Finance Report

Kathleen Quilligan has a story in today's NS about my letter to the election board regarding Matt Kelty's missing campaign finance report.

Jeff Pruitt, a contributor to the blog Fort Wayne Left, wrote the election board Monday, saying the Kelty for Mayor campaign did not file the appropriate paperwork after it received a $1,000 donation from Kelty supporter and fellow blogger Dan Turkette.

The donation was received by the campaign May 3, which was after the pre-primary finance report deadline, April 13. According to Indiana statute, candidates are required to file paperwork listing contributions of $1,000 or more after that deadline until 48 hours before the primary election.

"I hope that they apply the law as it's supposed to be applied, because I don't think they did last time,” said Pruitt, adding he wasn't sure if his reading of the law is correct.

Kelty said his campaign became aware there was a question that they filed the correct paperwork for the contribution after the Election Board closed Monday night. He said the campaign was looking through its files to make sure the donation was recorded properly, and if it discovered there was an oversight, it would talk with the Election Board this morning.

“In the closing days of the election, all kinds of checks come in,” Kelty said.

Readers might remember that although "all kinds of checks come in" right before the primary the only one that happened to not have a supplemental filing was Dan Turkette's. I hope to have more on this later today.

Quilligan's article states that the fine for a late filing can be up to $100. But let's not kid ourselves, this isn't a late filing, this is a failure of the Kelty campaign to file the required report. So what's the penalty for that?

IC 3-14-1-14
Failure to file required report
Sec. 14. A person who fails to file a report with the proper office as required by IC 3-9 commits a Class B misdemeanor.

IC 35-50-3-3
Class B misdemeanor
Sec. 3. A person who commits a Class B misdemeanor shall be imprisoned for a fixed term of not more than one hundred eighty (180) days; in addition, he may be fined not more than one thousand dollars ($1,000).

Journal Gazette Agrees on Election Board Whitewash

I gave out quite a laugh when I saw the "WHITEWASH" headline above this morning's editorial covering the Allen County Election Board hearing. As readers might remember that was my exact sentiment after leaving the hearing:

As I was leaving another local blogger asked me what I thought about the hearing and I flipped to the last page in my notebook where I had inscribed a single word that encapsulated my feelings

WHITEWASH

I guess I should just be happy that I actually agree with the JG editorial board as that's become somewhat of a rarity lately. However, an attribution would've been nice...

Election Board Whitewash

The Allen County Election Board voted down party lines and in a 2-1 vote said that they found no violations of campaign finance laws and would not recommend forwarding it to the county prosecutor.

It was a pathetic display all around. The two Republican board members (Therese Brown and David Wright) asked ONE question between the two of them and Bopp didn't directly answer a SINGLE QUESTION from Andy Downs' (D) list.

The structure of the meeting was a joke. I assumed it would be a Q&A session that would allow for the board members to have their questions answered by Bopp and/or Kelty. Instead, it started off with Downs giving a 15 minute presentation covering the law, his own commentary and numerous questions.

Instead of answering any of the questions, Bopp immediately attacked Downs:

Frankly I'm taken aback because I've been doing this a long time and have gone before many state and county election boards and I've never seen the prosecutor sit on the board.

You are a Democrat and you have a motive and are acting as the prosecutor. We're not in your classroom.

As expected, Bopp's argument was that the only loans that need to be reported are those made TO the committee. Of course the law explicitly states that loans made TO OR FOR the committee need to be reported but Bopp glossed over that section of the code and nobody challenged him on it. Then he continued his disrespect towards Downs and drew applause from the crowd when he said that Downs was a partisan that was trashing Kelty. He then continued with the same stump speech he made at the press conference.

Eventually Bopp made his argument for why the matter should not be sent to the prosecutor:

There's no case law covering this and since this is not a clear cut matter, and there's no substantial evidence, then it doesn't meet the requirement to be sent to the prosecutor. You need to have a substantial reason to believe there was a violation.

For those of you not in attendance - be thankful. While I've commended our city council for being a shining example of democracy, today's election board hearing was democracy at its worst. How can the Republican board members not have A SINGLE question to ask? To be fair, Wright did ask one question but it was an open ended softball question:

Could you discuss the issue of the contribution being made in another's name?

Give me a break. At least he feigned a question - Brown didn't even bother. Her only statement was to say that Downs' presentation was highly subjective and that she didn't see any violation.

And what did Wright have to say of his decision:

I've spent many a sleepless night on this issue. For Therese and I, we're damned if you do and damned if you don't. I want to come out of here with my integrity and honor. I absolutely can't find any violation as the statute stands today. Is there a loophole? Possibly.

Honor and integrity are not words I would use to describe today's hearing. I think the same outcome could have been reached while maintaining the integrity of the election board had the Republican members actually done their job and tried to get some answers. But such is life when dealing with the Allen County Republican Party.

As I was leaving another local blogger asked me what I thought about the hearing and I flipped to the last page in my notebook where I had inscribed a single word that encapsulated my feelings

WHITEWASH

Kelty Hearing Preview

I'm sure everyone reading this knows that the hearing will be about Matt Kelty's campaign finance reporting in regards to $160K in personal loans. The election board, comprised of 2 Republicans and 1 Democrat, will discuss the issue and ask questions of Kelty and his lawyer James Bopp. Afterwards, they will likely rule whether or not the matter should be forwarded on to the county prosecutor.

The gist of Bopp's argument will be that the loans were made to the candidate and not the committee, so therefore the source of the loans need not be reported. Bopp will claim that this is no different than a candidate taking a cash advance on his credit card. It will be interesting to see if Bopp actually references any statute within the Indiana Code to support his argument because, to date, I do not believe he has made such a reference.

As previously blogged (here and here), I believe the Kelty campaign violated IC 3-9-5-14:

IC 3-9-5-14. Committee’s treasurer reports.
(b) The report of each committee’s treasurer must disclose the following:
(3) The following information regarding each person who has made one (1) or more contributions within the year, in an aggregate amount that exceeds the threshold contribution amount in actual value to or for the committee, including the purchase of tickets for events such as dinners, luncheons, rallies, and similar fundraising events

Even Bopp admits that the loan was made for the purpose of the campaign. Thus it was made FOR the committee even if it wasn't made TO the committee and, as the statute indicates, any contribution made FOR the committee must be reported.

It will be interesting to see what questions the election board chooses to ask. I would like to know Bopp's answer to the following:

1. Bopp has argued that personal loans are held to a different standard than normal contributions. Following Bopp's argument couldn't any contribution be reclassified as a forgivable "loan" and thus not have to be reported?

2. Isn't a personal loan made specifically for the campaign quite distinct from a credit card cash advance that is not earmarked for the election and can be used at any time?

3. If a loan is made for the sole purpose of furthering a campaign then is that loan not considered to be made for the campaign committee?

4. Under what circumstances can a campaign contribution be made to a candidate and not have to be turned over to the campaign committee?

I will be covering the hearing tomorrow so drop me a line if you plan on being in attendance. Here's the info for those interested:

3:30 p.m. Tuesday
Allen County Building Department
1 W. Superior St.
1st floor meeting room

Election Board Schedules Hearing for Kelty

The News Sentinel is reporting that the election board will hold a public hearing on June 19th regarding Matt Kelty's campaign finances:

Public hearing

When: 3:30 p.m. June 19

Where: To be determined

On the agenda: The Allen County Election Board will hear arguments regarding Republican mayoral candidate Matt Kelty’s campaign finances.

I will certainly be on the scene and will try to live blog the event by posting regular updates and most likely rebuttals to James Bopp's arguments.

Stay Tuned...