Allegations of Bias in Erie Municipal Election: Meritless but Problematic

[UPDATE: Within two hours of posting, our article was removed from the Erie Colorado facebook page. After communicating with admins, who said the post had not been removed, the post reappeared.]

There are allegations of bias in the orchestration of the upcoming Erie elections. While most of the country slumbers between Trump tweets and school massacres, waiting for the 6th of November to determine the makeup of the 116th congress and the effect on governing power in the White House, Erie looks to a local governmental building and the balance of power on a slightly smaller scale. Erieites will go to the polls on April 3rd, 2018, to elect a new mayor and three trustees. They will also decide the fate of local ballot measures 3A and 3B.

While Erie has had its share of drama induced elections, the recent claims of bias in the orchestration of our municipal elections got our attention. Where Channel 4 ran the story with speculation instead of fact checking and authenticating (which we felt was a bit on the haphazard side of journalism), we have spent weeks investigating so as not to cause undue alarm in our community or raise the spectre of cheating when none has occurred.

Channel 4 Reports

Channel 4 made some specious claims both about the nature of our town and of the election complaints. “Political specialist Shaun Boyd” began by claiming that County Line Road divided our town between “ultra-conservative Weld county on this side, and ultra-liberal Boulder county on that side,” a claim that has no rooting in fact, nor bearing on the situation. In fact, Weld went 70 percent blue in the 2016 elections and voted over 50 percent for statewide marijuana amendment 64. Channel 4’s coverage opted to promote a controversy to hike ratings without looking fully into the controversy. Nancy Parker wasn’t even aware of the news report when we spoke to her on March 15. They didn’t call her.

Channel 4’s video “report” interviewed Fred Mahe who is correct that, “just because there’s no criminal wrongdoing doesn’t mean that there’s no ethical wrongdoing”. That said, it is also important to examine why Mr. Mahe and the deLuise’s have made these complaints, for what purpose, and to what ends. Mahe says, “First we have Russian collusion, now we have Erie collusion,” but who’s colluding?

The Channel 4 report can be viewed here.

The Complaints

The complaints filed, according to information provided to Yellow Scene Magazine by Mr. Mahe, who himself shared the documents with Channel 4 and on Facebook, were filed with the offices of deputy town clerk, Jessica Koenig; town administrator, A.J. Krieger; Erie town lawyer, Mark Shapiro; and Weld County District Attorney, Michael J. Rourke.

Neither of the lawyers, Rourke nor Shapiro, were available for comment; calls went unanswered and unresponded. Koenig and Kreiger both declined to comment in calls made to their offices. An Erie Records Request (CORA) was filed on the 26th of February seeking access to the complaint documents and to verify that complaints were indeed filed. Additional CORA requests were filed seeking to authenticate the 360-some pages that Fred and his collaborators, Jan and R. Scott deLuise, have provided.

Allegations included in the complaints contend that, “through a CORA [Colorado Open Records Act] request, documentation disclosed that the ballot process was compromised as follows:

1. On less than 24 hours’ notice from the former Clerk, the drawing was moved by a week from Jan. 31 to Jan. 23;

*Screenshot, email exchange between A.J. Krieger and the Board of Trustees

2. The slips with the names of candidates were of different sizes;

*Screenshot, section, provided in CORA documents given to Yellow Scene Magazine

3. The Town Administrator has expressed significant concern about the integrity of the ballot drawing process;

*Screenshot, email exchange between A.J. Krieger and the Board of Trustees

4. There are allegations made that the former Clerk had discussions about the election with one or more of the candidates prior to the drawing;

*Screenshot, email exchange between A.J. Krieger and Mayor Tina Harris

5. The former Clerk abruptly resigned after being questioned about the ballot drawing process.”

*Screenshot, Email from Former Town Clerk to Board of Trustees

In order to corroborate these claims, we have asked for and received the documents Mahe and deLuise obtained through the CORA request, detailing email exchanges between the town administrator, A.J. Krieger, Erie mayor Tina Harris, former town clerk Nancy Parker, and the current Board of Trustees. Additionally, we have filed an Erie Records Request seeking any and all complaints filed with any city government offices or officers. The request was received by Deputy Town Clerk Jessica Koenig, one of those whose office allegedly received a complaint. We found it troubling that, of two records requests submitted, one was dismissed entirely and the other was delayed until the 14th. Legally, the town clerk can delay fulfillment of a request for up to 7 days, but that has to be accompanied by a legal explanation based in a very limited spectrum of logics for delay. No legal explanation was given. An email back to Koenig’s office asking for an explanation has not been returned.

Fred Mahe, Jan and R. Scott deLuise

As stated, Yellow Scene was alerted to the existence of the complaints and the alleged process irregularities by Jan deLuise, who  filed the complaints. The CORA requests were submitted by Fred Mahe.

Fred Mahe is a long term (six year) employee of the deLuise’s, who own and operate Adjusters International Matrix Business Consulting in Broomfield. Fred is the Director of Sales. Jan deLuise is the chief financial officer. Her husband, R. Scott deLuise, is the president and CEO. Yellow Scene called AIMB to ask about their political donations and to ask if they had a PAC. Mr. Mahe, however, declined to answer any questions about his or his company’s political affiliations, instead stating that he’s a concerned citizen seeking a fair election, along with Jan. We find it odd that, in seeking a fair election, he would release documents on facebook rather than allowing journalists to sift through them and find the conclusion. Releasing documents to the public on facebook only serves to create chaos among the electorate, unfounded concerns, and unnecessarily shroud candidates in airs of bias and impropriety.

We sat down at Morning Glory Cafe on March 11 over coffee with Jan and R. Scott deLuise to discuss their involvement. Paralleling Mr. Mahe’s comments, Mr. deLuise said, about both Mahe’s and their own agenda, “I think his motives are the same as ours and that is just transparency. We just want everything to be fair. And it hasn’t been.” No information that isn’t in the documents was provided over the course of our conversation.

Mr. deLuise ended the conversation by asking pointedly why I had called to inquire about his company possibly having a PAC. He was told in no uncertain terms, that “I was trying to figure out why two people from the same company were the ones that filed a complaint… objectively, standing back looking at it, its seems weird.”

Towards the end of our conversation, I commented, “What’s the end game?  Who’s making the accusations? Who said what? Somebody trying to derail Jennifer?  Somebody trying to help Dan? Somebody trying to…” It was prescient, as we have found since that Fred Mahe is on Dan Woog’s campaign staff and posts from the official Woog for Mayor facebook account.

Add on top of this the fact that Dan Woog sent an inquiry email to both the town administrator and the Board of Trustees to inquire about the election happenings when he very well knows that any and all election questions and complaints would go directly to the town clerk. Which begs the question, why would Dan Woog create a more public spectacle when he knows through first hand experience it’s not the way to handle that inquiry? And then why would his campaign staff work to file complaints that are essentially without merit, including what appear to be made up allegations against Jennifer Carroll?

Finally, Mahe’s CORA requests included Nancy Parker’s personal email address, an email address not publicly known. Someone on the board would have to have given that information to Mahe in order for those personal emails to become known. He is a known campaign worker for Dan Woog. Is this being directed by Woog? We can’t say for certain.

In the end, it appears this is a bit of a shadow game, an election season spectacle that is summarily dismissed as meritless by duly authorized investigating entities and only serves to taint the Carroll campaign.

Finally, it should be noted that Jan deLuise has a history of speaking out against Mark Gruber, as evidenced by this letter to the Colorado Hometown Weekly, dated 2013.

Nancy Parker’s Statement

We spoke with former town clerk Nancy Parker on March 15. She offered a succinct statement regarding the allegations that she spoke with Mark Gruber and Jennifer Carroll in November, in advance of the election:

“I was the dedicated election official for the Town of Erie. It would not be uncommon for me to have conversations about the election with candidates or other people. There was no inappropriate conversation. I have not had any inappropriate conversations with any candidates, citizens, members of council regarding the election.”

In fact, both Mark Gruber and Jennifer Carroll denied having this conversation as well. Carroll remembers it as a public engagement, in a park, with her devoting the bulk of her time to her toddler who wasn’t feeling well.

The question becomes, if all three parties claim the conversation never happened, why did town administrator Krieger tell Mayor Harris that Nancy Parker had claimed the conversation took place?

*Screenshot, email from AJ Krieger to Tina Harris

Tina Harris Responds

The following screenshot was taken from Erie Mayor Tina Harris’ official Facebook page, posted on March 15. While we are apt to agree with her sentiments, the fact that all of this transpired and the city chose not to alert the public to any of the issues, investigations, or complaints is the exact reason the town is in an uproar. Mayor Harris and town administrator Krieger both opted for closed door conversations with city staff instead of public transparency.

Closing Thoughts

Erie is facing a future of combatting interests, of slow versus rapid growth, of oil and gas proponents versus oil and gas opponents, of activist candidates versus established politicos. Erie deserves, as do all communities, elections that are free of influence from both within the governing body and from those who favor one candidate over another.

The community should be able to expect A.J. Krieger, Jessica Koenig, Mark Shapiro, and Michael Rourke to be forthcoming with the citizens of Erie and transparent about the process in place to ensure a fair and impartial election in our little town, especially when complaints have been formally filed. In an age of Russian conspiracies, SuperPAC’s, and hyper-partisanship at the highest levels, we should hold our local elections to the highest standards.

We will update this story as more information becomes available.