Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Lawsuit alleges Corroon broke campaign finance law
SALT LAKE CITY -- The former chairman of the Salt Lake County Republican Party has filed suit against Democratic gubernatorial nominee Peter Corroon, accusing him of violating campaign finance laws that he signed as county mayor.
James Evans filed the lawsuit Wednesday in Utah's 3rd District Court. He wants Corroon to be ordered to return more than $300,000 in donations he accepted through his Corroon Leadership political action committee.
Salt Lake County prohibits individual contributions that exceed $2,000. Contractors that do work with the county are prohibited from donating more than $100 to county officials' campaigns.
Among others exceeding those limits, Corroon's PAC accepted $10,000 donations from the Southwest Regional Council of Carpenters, Utah AFL-CIO and AEB Enterprises.
Corroon campaign manager Donald Dunn claims the limits only apply to county races.
"There is absolutely no truth or merit in anything that James Evans has put in this lawsuit, and James Evans is notorious for having his trick-or-treat campaign surprises and being a negative dirty trickster," Dunn said. "It doesn't surprise us that we're seeing his head pop up right before Halloween."
Corroon has made campaign finance reform one of the signature issues in his race against GOP Gov. Gary Herbert. Corroon has proudly touted the county's campaign finance limits and said he would seek to put caps in place on a statewide level if he were elected governor.
Herbert has said he opposes campaign contribution limits.
Evans contends Corroon was effectively using his political action committee as a second mayoral campaign account in 2009, although Corroon had already said he wasn't seeking re-election as mayor.
Corroon didn't formally announce he was running for governor until earlier this year.
"That (PAC) was filed before he ran for governor in 2009," Evans said. "People gave significant amounts of money because he was county mayor, and he benefitted from it because he's county mayor."
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Salt Lake County Zap Bond for Community Centers IS NOT fiscally conservative
So let's take a look at the recent news article on the Salt Lake County ZAP bonds that are building government rec centers across SLCO from the SLTRIB You paid for 'em, you got 'em: more rec goodies
Despite the downturn, rec centers have continued to rise in Salt Lake City, Herriman and Millcreek; trails have continued to branch out in Sugar House and Cottonwood Heights; skate parks have continued to pop up in Kearns and Midvale.Bonding and raising sales tax to build government-run rec centers at a time when Salt Lake County had to cut $140 million dollars from their budget isn't exactly "fiscal conservatism" Taxpayers will have to pay towards those bonds in the future and while borrowing money to build a rec center may create a temporary job for construction workers, there is no long term economic return on a public rec center.
Why? Because public funds didn’t stop paying for those amenities during the recession.
“The projects gave a boost to our economy,” Corroon said. “We were able to put construction workers back to work.”
That said, the ZAP tax also put funding for recreation centers above other critical services during tough economic times, according to the Utah Taxpayers Association.I wonder if the County employees who were laid off due to the budget shortfall are able to enjoy their time off at their new local rec center?
Howard Stephenson, a state senator and president of the business-backed association, described ZAP as “bad tax policy,” steering money toward a specific purpose — parks and recreation — without any consideration of overall government spending.
“A governing body,” he said, “should have to weigh expenses for zoos, arts and parks along with police, fire and streets.”