January 5, 2007

Mike Ritz Learns To Dance

Watchdog has become involved in a major effort to put all campaign contributions in a huge data base so that anyone could find out who contributed to local elected officials (e.g. City Council, County Commission, Mayors, etc), how much they contributed and when they contributed. This data base would let you know the lawyers, developers, contractors, architects, politicians and others who contribute. Also we want to list the expenditures by the candidates and some of these are quite interesting and some are questionable.

Commissioner Mike Ritz before the August election promised in an advertisement the following.

• Create a “blue ribbon” ethics panel to study improvements to campaign finance reporting and to provide reports by internet access.

Watchdog wrote to Mr. Ritz and asked him to provide this information in an electronic form as stated in his ad.

I chair the ethics ad hoc committee and we are moving in that direction. If I gave my info to the election commission today on e format, they could not do anything with it. I appreciate your attention. -Mike

He is dancing again. It is true that the election commission could not do anything with it (or better said, would not do anything with it) but we asked for the information to be put on votinginmemphis.com which we are doing. If he wants to lead, let him do so by example. The public needs to understand that to put this information in a data base, we have to buy the reports from the election commission and then enter the information in the data base. It is a labor intensive process and since Mr. Ritz and others have it in electronic format, why could they not provide it in that format?

All of this type information is available for statewide candidates on a State of Tennessee website (tennesseeanytime.org) and you do not have to sign any form or leave your name to get the information. However, local candidates do not have to provide this information in electronic form although it is obvious that in most cases they keep track of the information in electronic format. Another interesting fact is that when anyone goes down to the Shelby County Election Commission and asks to see copies of reports on contributions and expenses, the election commission makes that person sign a form to show who is asking for the information and that form says at the bottom “PLEASE NOTE: A COPY OF THIS NOTICE WILL BE SENT TO THE PERSON WHOSE CAMPAIGN FINANCIALL DISCLOSURE FILES WERE INSPECTED OR COPIES.”

This is a form of intimidation and watchdog wonders if this is prescribed by law or if it is just a policy of the local Shelby County Election Commission. Watchdog will find out and report.

In any event, we are reporting on Mr. Ritz and his contributors and his expenses which will eventually be put into the data base.

Click here to see Mike Ritz's contributors and expenditures and to see what it costs to become a Shelby County Commissioner

Click here to see the form that you have to sign before they will let you look at election forms and before you have to pay 25 cents per page to copy