Thursday, December 01, 2016

Rivers' complaints supported by PDC: Enforcement Hearing on December 8. Time for Rivers to resign.

This dropped into my in-box today as a notice of partial adjudication of my Public Disclosure Commission complaints filed against Sen. Ann Rivers.  I'm announcing it here since I have a better chance of winning the lottery than I do ever seeing this published (certainly with any accuracy) in the daily democrat.

Further, you can bet that if the rag DOES publish anything about this (and can we ever forget all their efforts to publish even a HINT of a complaint against David Madore... even those which have been unfounded?  And, of course, wh can forget that to the best of my knowledge, when Madore has been cleared of these complaints, the rag doesn't report that?) they won't email me about it but will quote Rivers' excuses extensively to give a FOL (friend of Lou) all the cover they can.

Other complaints remain unaddressed.  The Complaint against County Council Chair Marc Boldt for seemingly removing and keeping $5000 from his 2012 complaint has yet to be adjudicated but is still active.
From: PDC Support
Sent: November 30, 2016 6:38:46 PM PSTTo: XXXXXXXXXXXXX@YYYYYYYYY.COM Subject: Re: PDC - RE: Request for update: how much longer until this case is adjudicated? 
Mr. Hinton,  
PDC staff has completed its investigation of the complaints you filed against Ann Rivers.  Staff has filed a Notice of Administrative Charges and scheduled an Enforcement Hearing before the Full Commission for December 8, 2016.  
I have attached the hearing documents for the Ann Rivers case, which will be posted to the PDC website on Friday as part of the December 8, 2016, Commission meeting materials.  
Please note that the surplus funds complaint you filed is not included in this case, since it was filed with the PDC after my Report of Investigation had been completed.      

Sincerely,  


Kurt Young PDC Compliance Officer 
Note that the surplus funds complaint also remains active: a review of Rivers' PDC's shows she claims that $135,000 was transferred to her surplus funds early last August, but a review of her surplus fund account shows there have been no deposits to that account for over 3 years... meaning that, on paper at least, that money has simply vanished.

Regarding the complaint at issue here, the following excerpts are from the PDC's own Notice of Administrative Hearing:


Rivers, of course, overstated the amount deliberately and knew it was overstated, yet did nothing about it until I filed my complaint... and even then, did nothing to address the overstated amount.  Instead, the PDC itself summarily reduced the amount of money she had showing in her campaign account by around $175,000 or so, approximately a year after Rivers first inflated her that account.

That Rivers knew about it is indisputable: you don't magically see your account mysteriously balloon up by that amount and not wonder what the hell happened.

As a campaign consultant and experienced politician, having entered into her 5th year of elective office, there is no acceptable excuse for this and, I m sure, the full commission will conclude... as I have... that her efforts here were deliberate.

According to the PDC, all of these documents will be available when they are posted tomorrow in preparation for her upcoming hearing.  When I get the link, I'll post it immediately.

This wasn't a mistake.  Rivers knew the number in her PDC's was wrong for months.  She had ample opportunity to address the issue and to resolve it.  She did nothing.

Waiting until *I* blog about it to even acknowledge the issue to anyone is as bogus as lying about your position on the gas tax/tab fee increases to get elected, and then betraying those who supported you, worked for you, volunteered for you and sadly, believed in you.

Regardless of the outcome of this matter, the upcoming matter of vaporized money is just as bad, if not worse.

There is zero excuse for this...  If she had any honor or integrity, I wouldn't even have to point this out:

Rivers should resign.  The sooner, the better.

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