Local candidates accuse each other of misconduct

Elysia Glover Assistant News Editor

Town of Poughkeepsie Republican Chairman Tom Martinelli has filed a complaint with State elections officials against incumbent Democrat Supervisor Patricia Myers. Republicans are accusing Myers of failing to submit the required campaign donor information to election officials.

Myers, who will square off with Republican GOP Supervisor candidate John Weisman in the Nov. 6 general election, is seeking a second two-year term. Weisman, the current Chairman of the Planning Board, is posing fierce competition.

According to The Poughkeepsie Journal, Myers claims that she filed the proper forms with both state and Dutchess County election officials, and assures voters she has nothing to hide and has only received nominal donations over the past two weeks.

Upon investigation, it was found that Myers’ campaign had actually filed what is known as an “in-lieu-of” statement with state officials, in place of the required full report. Such a statement, as the name implies, is a temporary placeholder for a full, itemized report. Dutchess Elections Commissioner David Gamache said Myers does in fact appear to be in violation of election law. State elections officials announced Monday that they will review Martinelli's complaint.

Martinelli has also claimed that Myers' campaign has yet to file its required January finance report with state officials.

The reports are designed to maintain campaign transparency. Over a year ago, the state enacted a law requiring candidates and committees to file reports electronically with state elections officials, while continuing to submit paper reports to their county boards of elections.

Myers’ campaign was fined $500 for the infraction. She stated that in May she did not file with the state because she had lost the PIN number. Myers insisted that she paid the fine.

On Monday Oct. 15, Myers went on to argue that she had no activity to report in January because she received no donations from the time of her November 2005 election through last year.

The Republican reaction came following last week’s public criticism by Poughkeepsie Democrats of campaign funding received by Weisman. The criticism was directed at campaign donations from multiple developers who had or were slated to appear before the Planning Committee of which he is chairman.

With the filing of Weisman’s official donor list to the Board of Elections came heated debate between members of the two parties as to whether or not Weisman had officially violated conflict of interest and ethics codes. Repeated calls by the Democrats for the Board of Elections to carry out an investigation have yet to be answered with action by Board officials.

Nevertheless, the Poughkeepsie-area Democrats are calling for Weisman’s immediate resignation, claiming that the political donations, which numbered in the thousands, were in direct violation of state election ethics codes.

As stated in an Oct. 10 press release, Bob Gephard, Town Democratic Committee Chair, said that “Weisman has hung a For Sale sign out in front of the Town of Poughkeepsie.”

Gephard continued to argue that Weisman’s acceptance of thousands of dollars in contributions from builders and developers appearing before his committee was clearly unethical, and possibly illegal. “Jon Weisman has lost all credibility as planning board chair, and he needs to step down immediately,” said Gephard.

Weisman denies any violation of election ethics codes and has repeatedly assured the voting public that he has no intention of stepping down.