Shelley Staff Assigned Partisan Duty, Records Say

SAN FRANCISCO —  In the two years since Kevin Shelley became California’s chief elections official, his state-paid staff has been repeatedly assigned duties that promote his private political agenda, records and interviews show.

State law prohibits using public employees for private political purposes, and Shelley as secretary of state is expected to run his office in a nonpartisan fashion.

But his daily office calendars, obtained by The Times, show that staff members were routinely scheduled to attend events such as campaign fundraisers, rallies and other political gatherings sponsored by Democratic organizations and Shelley’s supporters. Many of the events occurred during last year’s gubernatorial recall and this year’s presidential election campaign.

The use of staff members to do partisan work is not unique. “Politicians all the time use their staff for political purposes,” said Michael Josephson, head of the nonprofit Josephson Institute of Ethics in Los Angeles. “It is a problem” and in some cases violates the law, he said, “but it has become the norm.”

What separates the secretary of state from every other Sacramento office, Josephson and others say, is its responsibility to protect the integrity of elections.

For weeks, Shelley has been engulfed by a legal storm that began this summer when the FBI and the state attorney general’s office opened investigations into the alleged channeling of state grant money into his 2002 campaign. The state auditor is examining his awarding of no-bid contracts to political associates.

The San Francisco Chronicle recently reported that Shelley may have violated a state law by allegedly accepting a campaign contribution in his San Francisco office. And The Times reported that he regularly used state workers to retrieve donations from his campaign mailbox here, which his office said happened only rarely.

Shelley has denied any wrongdoing or violations of law, but the allegations trouble many observers of state government.

“This is the secretary of state and he is supposed to be the nonpartisan, neutral arbiter of elections and keeper of [campaign] finance data,” said Bruce Cain of the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies. “Of all the offices for this to happen, this is the worst in that it undermines public confidence in the election process.”

When Shelley took office last year, his predecessor, Bill Jones, offered him one piece of advice, according to both men. It was: Be scrupulously nonpartisan.

Shelley declined to be interviewed for this report, citing the current investigations.

Spokesman John Pachtner, however, defended Shelley’s performance in office: “It is clear that he has in his official capacities been a terrific, nonpartisan secretary of state. He was credited with running a historic state recall election in nonpartisan fashion.”

Pachtner said Shelley’s office never directed staff members to do political work, and there was nothing wrong if they attended political events on their own.

“It is expected as part of the job of working for an elected official,” Pachtner said. “Your job does not end after eight hours.” He later added that “it is not demanded, it is not assigned, it is something you do as an opportunity ... “

A ‘Resentful’ Staff

But Fred Hamdun, a former deputy to Shelley, disputed that. “Nothing is optional. You are expected to show,” he said.

“Every time someone would get picked, there was an open display of ‘Why do I have to do this?’ ” said Hamdun, who left the office earlier this year for what he said were professional differences with Shelley. “Everyone was overworked in the executive staff.... They [also] were resentful because it was inappropriate.”

Shelley’s daily schedules show that staff members were regularly designated to attend partisan events.

In the six months leading up to the October 2003 gubernatorial election, Shelley’s staff was assigned to attend events put on by Democratic organizations and labor groups that have supported Shelley or the party, according to records and interviews.

Among those functions were the May 21 annual dinner of the Truman Club, a Democratic Party organization in Sacramento; the June 7 Democratic Women’s Forum in San Francisco, honoring House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi; and the June 28 California Democratic Party Executive Board meeting in Oakland.

The schedules also show that staff members were assigned to political rallies over the last two years and to fundraising events for presidential candidate Sen. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, Sen. Barbara Boxer of California and state Treasurer Phil Angelides, all Democrats.

Shelley’s office declined to comment on the specific events and whether the staff completed the assignments.

Most events that staff attended were in the evenings, the lunch hour or on weekends. But sources familiar with the operations of Shelley’s office said that employees went as part of their state-paid duties. His daily schedule for the events notes “STAFF,” followed by the name or names of assigned state employees.

Bob Stern, president of the nonprofit Center for Governmental Studies in Los Angeles, said the “staff” designation on the schedules indicates it was part of the employee’s job. He said that if public employees were required to attend partisan events or fundraisers, it could violate laws against use of governmental staff for political purposes.

“If they are ... expected to do it, even if it is not on state time, it absolutely could be a violation,” said Stern, who worked in the secretary of state’s office in the 1970s and helped write the state’s political reform act. “If it is on state time, [the official] should use campaign staff.”

In response to Times inquiries, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s office said it does not assign staff -- except security and sometimes a media spokesman -- to partisan events.

“We would use campaign staff,” said communications director Rob Stutzman.

Former elections chief Jones said his staff would take vacation days or compensatory time if they chose to attend a political event. “It was never part of their duties,” said Jones, a Republican running for U.S. Senate.

Shelley held a political fundraiser June 24, 2003, several months after his election, that showed another sort of intertwining of his official duties and his campaign.

The event was scheduled for the nonprofit Golden State Museum, which adjoins the secretary of state’s office and operates under its aegis as the California State History Museum. Shelley’s fundraiser for the event was Dan Weitzman, whose offices are across the street from the secretary’s Sacramento office.

On May 29, 2003, a month before the event, Weitzman sent two faxes to Shelley’s government office in San Francisco with names of potential donors for Shelley to call. The cover sheet for the first noted, “I am also working on checks that Kyle brought over.”

This was a reference to Undersecretary Mark Kyle, who allegedly had ordered staff to pick up checks and other campaign mail from a private mailbox.

In a telephone interview, Weitzman said his office may have inadvertently sent the campaign contributors list to Shelley’s government fax machine rather than to the private one maintained by Shelley’s campaign organization. And he said that the checks he mentioned were not for the fundraiser but were small checks collected by Shelley.

Weitzman said Shelley tried to be “very careful” not to conduct campaign-related business in his state offices.

Kyle did not return a call seeking a comment, but he previously has denied directing state-paid staff members to do political work.

Shelley spokeswoman Carol Dahmen said, “I have no direct knowledge of what the checks were for. It’s kind of innocuous.”

Shelley’s schedule also indicates that staff members were assigned to attend the 5:30 p.m. event, which records show raised about $75,000.

Stern, the political reform expert, said having a public employee handling private campaign checks and having a contributor call list sent to a government office could be a problem if it involved work by public employees. “It is inappropriate and may be illegal,” he said.

Filling in at Events

Last year, one of Shelley’s staff members also acted as his surrogate on the county Democratic Central Committee in San Francisco, which worked on the anti-recall effort last year.

Gia Daniller, a voter outreach contractor Shelley hired with federal election funds, served as his surrogate this year at the local Democratic central committee, minutes show.

Daniller, who received an $8,000 contract, did not return a call seeking a comment. Former Chairwoman Jane Morrison said about half the elected officials on the committee use their staffs as surrogates. Shelley spokesman Pachtner said the work of the two surrogates was not part of their state jobs and that they were nonpartisan in executing their official duties.

Josephson said the practice using surrogates creates the appearance of impropriety.

“If we make an appointment of a public employee to a strictly partisan world, [people] think the public is paying for it, and it is inappropriate,” he said.