Portland "clean money" goes to work -- in California
Jesse Cornett, one of the candidates challenging Portland city commissioner Dan "Legend" Saltzman, is the only politician getting his campaign natterings paid for by the city's taxpayers this year under the "clean money" campaign finance system pioneered by Cornett's hero, the Suddenly and Suspiciously Disappearing Erik Sten. This makes Cornett the second most likely candidate to prevail in his race, but it also makes him an easy target for criticism.
One of the other players in the field, Mary Volm, alerts us to a curious aspect of the Cornett campaign: He's spent $13,370 of Portland taxpayer money on a poll that he had conducted by a political consulting firm down in the Bay Area. "With all the pollsters we have in city and state," Volm writes, "it's so nice to know our hard earned tax dollars used by a voter owned candidate are going to support California residents."
It seems like a fair point. But it's a shame that Saltzman's challengers are attacking each other when the sleepy incumbent is so obviously a deer in the headlights. He's got the killer cops, the bike-sewer fiasco, and other grotesque bureaucracy currently under his "leadership" -- if you can't take this guy out, you don't deserve to be on the City Council.
By the way, this is the year we Portlanders were supposed to get to vote on the wonderful "clean money" system, isn't it? Where's the referendum, City Council? You weren't lying to us, were you?
| Posted at 8:49 PM | Permalink |
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Comments (15)
Where's all the Creepy and Randy et al supporter fans who were proponents of the clean money?
Let me guess, they don't have a problem with the clean money results and now with no vote?
They just like these comissioners?
I think more attention and shaming should be aimed at these supporters.
Posted by Ben | March 23, 2010 9:21 PM
Darn. Busted I suppose. Somewhere near two weeks since first reporting the expenditure, somebody paid attention. I thought that after entering it into public record an expenditure that large would just go completely unnoticed. Oopsie. Busted.
Posted by Jesse Cornett | March 23, 2010 9:50 PM
I am sure Fritz will be the one to have the City Council put the referendum on the ballot-just like she promised. I hope she hasn't forgotten.
Posted by Lee | March 23, 2010 10:04 PM
Jesse, I'll make you a deal. You tell us the real reason Sten ran out of town, and I'll vote for you.
Posted by Jack Bog | March 23, 2010 11:11 PM
After the election the publicly funded campaign is supposed to return things like computers that were purchased with the money. I demanded from the city an opportunity bid on or obtain the raw poll results that were paid for by the Amanda Fritz campaign. The city (and Amanda) refused. If the poll results have no value they should be made available for free. If the poll results have value they should be sold to anyone in like manner to a computer. Instead they either vanish or become the personal, though invaluable, asset of the candidate.
Posted by pdxnag | March 24, 2010 2:35 AM
Any Candidate Except Saltzman
Posted by ACES | March 24, 2010 3:14 AM
He'll get re-elected, it's been proven the average voter doesn't have a clue or really care about issues or people running. They just say, "I've heard that named before, so that's who I'll vote for."
Posted by phil | March 24, 2010 6:24 AM
How typical.
Jessie drops by with a clever "oh gee whiz I got caught" routine and appears to think that's an adequate substitute for actually EXPLAINING WHY he used a California company.
Apparently if you're Blue through and through around here that is good enough.
Posted by Ben | March 24, 2010 7:41 AM
I have this strange feeling that the Jesse Cornett in the comments above is not the same as the Grimace lookalike running for city council.
Posted by Garage Wine | March 24, 2010 7:55 AM
TO PDXNAG,
I like your thinking. Try emailing a request to the City Auditor herself using ORS 192 (Oregon's Public Records Law). If they deny you the Poll records, then you can appeal ("petition") to the MultCo Asst District Attorney Hoover for his opinion- FREE! Then you may go to court yourself and make new legal precident!
Public financing = Public Records...
Posted by metro | March 24, 2010 8:19 AM
I've got a clue about Sten.
When questioned by the media about his purchase of a mansion in the West Hills he said he sold some houses on the east side that he inherited and used the cash. Trouble is he did not and he took out a $1 million mortgage on his West Hills home. To qualify for that mortgage he would have had to have an income close to $400,000 per year. Either he had a nice second source of income from who knows where or committed bank fraud on a "stated income" loan, a federal offense. We never found out which but he ran when the questions started being asked.
Posted by John | March 24, 2010 8:22 AM
For those asking about the vote on Portland public campaign funding, if you will remember from it's adoption by the Council, it will be placed on the 2010 November ballot.
Posted by Jim Robison | March 24, 2010 9:13 AM
Unless I am mistaken Sten's disappearance coincided with the new finance disclosures enacted by the legislature. You know, the one that resulted in volunteers and unpaid electeds departing councils and commissions in droves.
Posted by Robert Collins | March 24, 2010 9:26 AM
metro, Amanda Fritz did not surrender her raw poll results so it never became a public record in the custody of the city.
Posted by pdxnag | March 24, 2010 10:10 AM
Amanda Fritz also used a pollster in California (and printed her mailings in Eugene).
If public financing is to continue, there should be a "buy local" requirement to encourage would-be politicians from sending our money to other communities.
Posted by Doc Golightly | March 24, 2010 1:41 PM