Tag: luis toro

Progressive politics coalition Campaign for a Strong Colorado says state Treasurer Walker Stapleton should follow the advice he provided to the U.S. House Ways and Means committee this week when he argued in favor of the Public Employee Pension Transparency Act. "Greater transparency and better information is important for the fiscal health of our states and for our taxpayers," he said. Strong Colorado agreed and urged Stapleton to bring his point home to the taxpayers he serves by opening up his full current employment records so the Colorado public can see how he's earning his money and spending his time.

In the face of criticism that he is improperly meddling in a campaign finance case on behalf of a former private-practice client, Secretary of State Scott Gessler says he doesn't believe Coloradans should have to hire lawyers to steer clear of penalties when they simply want to participate in the political process.

Details concerning Colorado Treasurer Walker Stapleton's lucrative moonlighting arrangement with the California real estate firm he used to head will soon move out of public view. Stapleton's family finance business, Denver-based Stapleton Acquisitions Company, has announced it has completed its tender offer to purchase all SonomaWest common stock not presently held by the Stapleton family and Stapleton Acquisitions and that the deal to take SonomaWest private will likely be completed in the coming weeks.

Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler filed a brief with the attorney general last week supporting an appeal brought by election-politics group Clear the Bench in a campaign finance case. Gessler defended the group as a private attorney in the original case and so his support now as secretary of state is sure to raise more questions about his ability to serve the public without treading across ethical boundaries.

Weeks after Colorado Treasurer Walker Stapleton took office this past January he drew a flurry of questions about a lucrative consulting contract he made with SonomaWest Holdings, the Northern California real-estate firm he headed for years as CEO. Stapleton arranged to work for up to 250 hours per year with Sonoma for $150,000 while acting as Colorado's treasurer. Colorado AOL reporter Sandra Fish discovered the arrangement by looking at paperwork SonomaWest had to file as a public company, and government watchdogs took comfort from the fact that those public records filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission or SEC would continue to provide some level of transparency. Now Stapleton's family finance business, Denver-based Stapleton Acquisitions Company, is proposing to buy out shareholders of SonomaWest (pdf) and take the company private. That would mean no more filing with the SEC. It would mean no more public records from which to monitor Stapleton's moonlighting as a consultant.

Clear the Bench Colorado founder Matt Arnold this week lost another court case, the second case in the last half year, but not for lack of trying. Arnold appealed the ruling in the first case even as he leaned on that ruling to file the complaint in the second case. "I got out-lawyered," Arnold told Westword, conceding, even if unwittingly, that perhaps the both-ways legal strategy he took toward campaign finance laws over the last few months was less about winning than it was about sending messages.

Colorado State Senator Morgan Carroll, D-Aurora, said she missed an opportunity to head off the controversy now surrounding newly elected Secretary of State Scott Gessler. Carroll had been weighing whether or not to introduce legislation that would have set strict disclosure laws for the secretary of state's office in particular and tightened state worker conflict-of-interest laws in general. She didn't introduce that bill but that doesn't mean a legislative response to the Gessler controversy is off the table, she said.

Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler is no stranger to political controversy. He has represented a long line of conservative advocacy and attack groups and in that role has become the public face of partisan causes. Indeed, his name and the law firm he founded virtually stand for a branch of Colorado politics that seeks to limit government restrictions on and oversight of campaign financing. He has done battle repeatedly with laws the secretary of state is charged to enforce and now he is secretary of state. His election victory put government watchdog groups on high alert. News coming today, a little more than a week since he was sworn into office, that Gessler plans to keep working part-time as an attorney for his former firm even while serving as secretary of state has set conflict-of-interest alarm bells ringing in watchdog offices.

Nonprofit watchdog group Colorado Ethics Watch on Tuesday brought out a list reviewing five of the most glaring high-profile breaches of public trust in Colorado in 2010. Ethics Watch is often described (or dismissed) as "left-leaning," and it's true that its list this year spotlights the actions of four well-known Republican political figures. But it's also true that the names of three of the four men included on the list-- Doug Bruce, Dan Maes and Scott McInnis-- now mostly induce chortles and head shaking on the left and right in political circles across the nation. "We were trying to pick [instances] where there was no redeeming side. These were cases where there was no way to give a positive spin," Director Luis Toro told the Colorado Independent.

Democratic state Sens. Morgan Carroll of Aurora and Lois Court of Denver say stricter penalties and tighter legal definitions should be at the heart of upcoming legislation to prevent abuses to laws regulating those looking to sway public opinion in elections. Both legislators are working with watchdog groups to shore up what they see as serious holes in campaign finance and ethics laws after a mid-term election cycle marred by violations and rumors of clandestine deals.