A Pulaski County circuit judge on Tuesday upheld ethics sanctions against a Harrisburg lawmaker who said he did not know his mother would be considered part of his immediate family under state campaign-finance laws.
The Arkansas Ethics Commission fined Republican state Rep. John Hutchison $150 and issued him a sanctioning letter in February for using $863 in campaign funds to pay his mother’s electric bills in exchange for using space in her home as a campaign office between August and October.
Hutchison was elected to his first term in November after defeating Democrat L.J. Bryant by 45 votes, 5,059-5,014.
He disclosed the payments in his campaign finance reports. The commission determined that the expenditure was improper under state law that prohibits candidates from using campaign funds on personal expenses.
He appealed the censure to the court in March, and at a Tuesday hearing, his attorney, Bilenda Harris-Ritter of Maumelle, called on Judge Chris Piazza to vacate the sanctions on two points: Hutchison did not personally benefit from the expenditure, and the commission’s regulations don’t clearly state exactly whom candidates should consider family.
“It is key that family is not interpreted in this rule,” she told the judge. “It’s a secret from the public.”
When commission rules do refer to family, it’s described as the candidate, spouse and dependent children, said Harris-Ritter, who was joined in her defense by fellow attorneys George Ritter, her husband, and Doyle Webb, the state Republican Party chairman. The commission “stretched” its rules to include Hutchison’s mother as an immediate family member, she said.
“Mother is not included in the statute, so it cannot be added under the rule,” Harris-Ritter told the judge.
The fact that someone’s mother can be considered an immediate family member is not a secret, commission attorney Jill Rogers Barham countered.
“Everybody’s in on that secret, if it’s a secret,” Barham told the judge. “Family always begins with your mother.”
The regulation Hutchison was found to have violated, 209C of the commission’s Rules on Campaign Finance and Disclosure, derives its authority from a subsection of Arkansas Code 7-6-203, that outlines limitations on spending campaign funds.
The law states that “a candidate who uses campaign funds to fulfill any commitment, obligation or expense that would otherwise exist regardless of the candidate’s campaign shall be deemed to have taken campaign funds as personal income.”
The commission’s rules describe restricted expenditures, which include household food items, personal clothing, mortgage, rent, utility payments, membership dues, church donations and contributions to other campaigns. Hutchison was found to have violated the rules on utility payments with respect to a personal residence of the candidate or a family member.
Barham urged the judge to reject the argument that Hutchison had not personally profited from the expenditure, saying the payments themselves were improper under the law regardless of whether Hutchison benefited from them. She asked that he respect the “worthy intent” of the laws and uphold the sanctions.
“This is the type of behavior the commission and the Legislature want to prohibit,” she said.
With no dispute between the sides over the facts of the case, no testimony was taken, and the judge capped the 32-minute hearing with his ruling to uphold the penalties, saying he expected a higher court will ultimately have the final word on appeal.
“I’ll let you take it on up and get a decision,” Piazza said.
The arrangement between Hutchison and his mother was for him to pay her electric bill at her Arkansas 14 East home in exchange for office space. He paid $863 from campaign funds, with $301 going directly to her for August rent and the remainder, $562, paid to Entergy for the other two months.
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 8 on 07/22/2013