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On today's date in The Beacon archives, we published:
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Monday, September 10, 2007
More Campaigning by Sheriff Leis Using Taxpayer Dollars
Posted by Michael Earl Patton
It seems that there is no end to Sheriff Leis’s spending of taxpayer dollars to campaign for the new jail. First,
In his endorsement Sheriff Leis gets some major facts wrong, such as the number of early releases in 2006. He claims that it was “over 8,000,” though at the Commissioners’ staff meeting this Monday he conceded that the data sheet given to the commissioners earlier was accurate. That data sheet says that the number of early releases in 2006 was only 258. Mr. Leis also conceded during the meeting that the only ones released early since the county started sending inmates to Butler County were a relatively small number of females.
Sheriff Leis concludes his endorsement letter with naked campaigning: “It is easy to ignore the problem by saying no new taxes, but the County does not have funding for the new facility without additional taxes. The jail crisis requires leadership. Commissioners Fortune and Pepper have exemplified leadership in its truest form. They recognize the seriousness of the issue as it pertains to the safety and well being of our citizens, which the latter failed to recognize last November. The Portune-Pepper Plan and the jail issue deserves our support.”
That may well be Mr. Leis’s personal opinion, but many taxpayers and voters of Hamilton County disagree and object to his using taxpayer money to promote his personal opinion.
Per Section 9.03(C) of the Ohio Revised Code: “… no governing body of a political subdivision shall use public funds to do any of the following: (1) Publish, distribute, or otherwise communicate information that does any of the following: (a) ... (e) Supports or opposes the nomination or election of a candidate for public office, the investigation, prosecution, or recall of a public official, or the passage of a levy or bond issue.” (emphasis added).
Groups opposed to the jail tax do not have access to county funds to tell the voters their side of the issue—why does Sheriff Leis?
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10 Sep 2007 at 07:16 pm | #
MEP: You spend a great deal of time online blogging. You endlessly respond to every single post here. This raises a question, as you are running for office and many (most) people know little to nothing about you; Are you currently employed, and if so, in what field? I ask this because you seem to have an enormous amount of time available to you to write online posts, where other people would be working and thus too busy to blog for many hours per day, not to mention family obligations, etc.
If you want us to consider you for office I think that you owe it to the public to answer this question.
10 Sep 2007 at 08:25 pm | #
I am self-employed. This gives me a certain amount of flexibility. I am in the investment property business, but am getting out of it as I have stated before. The business climate, especially in the City of Cincinnati, is a disaster.
Yes, this takes up a lot of my time. It is now after 9 o’clock. But I consider the subjects to which I respond important.
No, I do not respond to every comment.
10 Sep 2007 at 09:35 pm | #
ignoring the always off-topic impersonator.......
This is the 3rd time in a week that Simon Leis has been caught using the Sheriff’s office to campaign for a tax increase, a tax increase that increases his own budget. This is plainly unethical behavior, if not illegal. I thought we had laws that prohibited taxpayer resources from being used to campaign. Is Simon Leis above the law?
The County Prosecutor needs to review this information to determine whether a violation has taken place. Lies needs to be told to stop this behavior or start facing legal charges.
11 Sep 2007 at 08:42 am | #
Jeff Capell you posted @ 9:35am; aren’t you at work blogging at the taxpayers expense?
11 Sep 2007 at 10:24 am | #
Careful guys, you can’t possibly suggest the all powerful Oz, I mean Sherrif has done something wrong. He doesn’t take kindly to criticism. WE’ll see how he responds tonight.
11 Sep 2007 at 04:22 pm | #
anonymous fool, this is CincyJeff and if you’d learn how to read you’d see I posted at 9:35 PM Beacon Time. You’re not too bright, are you?
11 Sep 2007 at 09:13 pm | #
Better not mess with Si again Jeff Capell, or one of his deputies might pull your car over and take you on a little ride that will end up with a nightstick up your backside!
And you are posting during working hours at 4:22pm today. I’ll let Si know all about your malfeasance at work. Coast can’t save you know....
12 Sep 2007 at 01:24 am | #
CincyBertie the racist impersonator still hasn’t figured out that Beacon Time is stamped one hour behind regular time. You’re still not that bright, are you? It’s starting to get boring correcting all of this fool’s mistakes. At least he’s figured out this whole AM/FM thing.
I’m sure Bertie knows a lot about getting nightsticks shoved up his ass. I’ll leave that field to him. Oh, and I just noticed he made an earlier post at 9:42 AM. Hypocrite.
12 Sep 2007 at 04:57 pm | #
That’s odd because the timestamp on my posts is always accurate. I think that Jeff Capell is trying to hide his giult about abusing the time clock.
Another thing; you work for the us, taxpayers Jeff, that’s the difference. When you blog at work on County time, you are actually stealing money from the public.
By the way, I am reliably informed that someone sent Si an email with details of
your online activities at work (oh, the power of Google). Si is perhaps the most
powerful, well connected single official in local government, and he’s a bad
person to make an enemy of. I bet that he makes good use of that informaton.
13 Sep 2007 at 08:59 am | #
Some of you have no clue do you?