{"id":63414,"date":"2019-03-21T21:33:27","date_gmt":"2019-03-22T03:33:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-dismisses-campaign-finance-complaint-filed-against-city\/"},"modified":"2019-03-22T03:33:27","modified_gmt":"2019-03-22T03:33:27","slug":"durango-dismisses-campaign-finance-complaint-filed-against-city","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-dismisses-campaign-finance-complaint-filed-against-city\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango dismisses campaign finance complaint filed against city"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"The
The city of Durango has rejected a campaign finance complaint filed by resident John Simpson, saying it has never adopted procedures for dealing with such a complaint.<\/span>Shane Benjamin\/Durango Herald file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A campaign finance complaint accusing Durango city councilors and the city manager of illegally using taxpayer money to encourage electors to vote for a proposed sales-tax increase has been rejected by the City Clerk\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n

In a news release Thursday, the city said Durango has not adopted regulations or a process to investigate and act on complaints filed under Colorado\u2019s Fair Campaign Practices Act. The city also said after legal analysis, there were no expenditures that would constitute a violation of state law.<\/p>\n

The FCPA is a state law drafted to ensure transparent and ethical political campaigns.<\/p>\n

John Simpson, the Durango resident who filed the complaint March 12, accused City Manager Ron LeBlanc and four city councilors \u2013 Sweetie Marbury, Dick White, Chris Bettin and Dean Brookie \u2013 of using city staff time, resources and equipment at a March 5 City Council meeting to produce and disseminate information urging voters to support ballot measure 1A<\/a>, which proposes to increase sales taxes by 0.5 percent to pay for the construction, operation and maintenance of streets, alleys, sidewalks, curbs and gutters.<\/p>\n

Councilor Melissa Youssef did not attend the meeting and is not named in the complaint.<\/p>\n

Durango is a home-rule municipality with the authority to adopt its own campaign finance rules and regulations, separate from the Colorado Secretary of State, the city wrote in its news release. The city said, \u201cThe Colorado Secretary of State does not have the authority to adopt rules or otherwise unilaterally delegate the power to the city of Durango to act on state FCPA complaints.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>

City Attorney Dirk Nelson said since Durango does not have a process by which to adjudicate FCPA violations, and since the secretary of state does not have the authority to require Durango to adjudicate state campaign finance rules, the city cannot accept or act on such complaints.<\/p>\n

Nelson said the city has the authority to enact campaign finance rules, it just hasn\u2019t done so. The Secretary of State\u2019s Office has taken the position that it does not have the authority to act on FCPA complaints in a home-rule municipality, and the city has no authority to rule on whether state law has been violated, Nelson said.<\/p>\n

Since neither Durango nor the Secretary of State\u2019s Office accept responsibility for addressing the complaint, there is no venue in which the alleged violation of state law can be adjudicated.<\/p>\n

Even if Durango had the authority to rule on the complaint, the city said Simpson\u2019s allegation does not constitute a use of city funds to promote a ballot issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we\u2019re taking the position that the facts he stated would not be a violation under state law,\u201d Nelson said.<\/p>\n

\"Simpson\"
Simpson<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Simpson said he isn\u2019t satisfied with the city\u2019s response. He said he \u201ccompletely expected\u201d a dismissal from the city, but he remains convinced the city used taxpayer resources to promote ballot measure 1A. He\u2019s dissatisfied with the lack of explanation from the city about how the city manager\u2019s and city councilors\u2019 comments on 1A at a City Council meeting, for which they are paid to attend, did not use city resources.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey used city resources to produce the City Council meeting and Council Connections (a video recap of the meeting), and they\u2019re hosting it on their website, and to every voter in Durango, that looks like city resources,\u201d Simpson said. \u201cRegardless of the legality, they owe the citizens an explanation of how they\u2019re not using city funds.\u201d<\/p>\n

Simpson said he would wait until after the April 2 election to pursue legal action against the city in regard to its response to his complaint. He hasn\u2019t done enough research to address the assertion that neither the city nor the secretary of state have authority to rule on his complaint, Simpson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe legal issue is a much bigger picture,\u201d Simpson said. \u201c\u2026 How can we come to an understanding of what is city resources and what isn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>

bhauff@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Campaign Finance Complaint (PDF)<\/a><\/p>\n

Campaign complaint dismissed (PDF)<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Municipality says it has no authority to rule on violation<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":63415,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[2811,28,308,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-63414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-campaign-finance","tag-headlines","tag-local-elections","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63414"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63414\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63414"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=63414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}