It appears to OpenCdA that the May 19 Coeur d’Alene $6 million, 10-year public safety bond election to fund capital expenditures for the police and fire departments violates Idaho law.
Idaho Code § 50-1019 explicitly identifies which municipal expenditures are permitted to be funded by bond proceeds. Fire departments are included in that well-defined list, however the law does not even come close to including police departments. The words “public safety” or “police” do not appear in the law.
But we’re not basing our concern on just our reading of the law. We’re basing it also on the actions of Coeur d’Alene City Administrator Jim Hammond and his attempt to get his cronies in the Idaho Legislature to very quickly and quietly pass cover-up legislation with an “emergency” clause so the City of Coeur d’Alene could proceed to do lawfully that which the law does not permit it to do now.
According to City Finance Director Troy Tymesen in his presentation to the Coeur d’Alene City Council meeting on January 6, 2015, the public safety bond idea was “hatched” (his word) in 2005, ten years ago. At the January 6 meeting he had Fire Chief Gabriel and Police Chief White as his stage props to help pitch the $6 million public safety bond. If you watch and listen to the linked video, pay particular attention to what Police Chief Lee White says the bond money will be used to purchase for the police department. Again, Idaho Code § 50-1019 authorizes bond proceeds to be used for fire department expenditures but not for police departments. And nowhere in I.C. § 50-1019 does the phrase “public safety” appear either.
Fast-forward this scheme to March 17, 2015, to the Coeur d’Alene City Council meeting. Remember the date: March 17, 2015. The minutes of that Council meeting reflect the Mayor and all members of Council were present and that in a roll call vote, the Council members voted unanimously to approve Council Bill 15-1003 passing an ordinance to authorize the May 19 general obligation bond election.
The March 17, 2015, Council meeting minutes contain language which show the City knew it did not have statutory authority to proceed with the bond election if it included expenditures for the police department.
“Mr. Tymesen clarified that the items proposed originally to be paid for with these funds has been modified to no longer include police vehicles based on legal opinion of the state code. The City Administrator, Jim Hammond, has proposed an amendment at the state legislature to clearly include police in the term public safety. However, the current code language does not include that, so staff has removed the police vehicles.” [emphasis ours]
Hammond’s proposed amendment was introduced in the Legislature as Senate Bill 1147 on March 3, 2015. On March 17, 2015, S 1147 received a committee hearing in front of the Senate Local Government and Taxation Committee. The Chairman of the Committee is Senator Jeff C. Siddoway. OpenCdA readers can and should listen to the audio from this hearing. It is available in the Legislature’s Digital Media Archive. The agenda item for S 1147 begins at time stamp 00:42:10 and concludes at 00:50:10. It begins with Chairman Siddoway passing the gavel to Vice Chairman Johnson. Why? Because as the audio makes very clear, it was Chairman Siddoway whom Coeur d’Alene City Administrator Hammond approached to make sure this coverup legislation got rammed through the Legislature without too much scrutiny. [Addendum on 04-14-2015: OpenCdA transcript of S 1147 hearing]
But a funny thing happened on the way to the City of Coeur d’Alene trying to get the Legislature to cover for the City’s apparent lack of legal authority: The House refused to go along. S 1147 was passed by the Senate but died in the House Ways and Means Committee.
Remember, at the January 6, 2015, Council meeting Tymesen said the idea had been “hatched” ten years ago. So why did the City wait until March 2015 to try and get the law changed to make it legal to include police expenditures in bond measures? OpenCdA has an uncomfortable suspicion that it will be the standard Idaho reason: “Well, we’ve always done it that way.”
And what was the “emergency” Hammond cited in the proposed legislation? That’s simple. The City has already committed to going forward with the bond election. If S 1147 had passed both the Senate and the House and been signed into law by the Governor, the public would never have known of the City’s illegal action.
If the City’s actions in the May 19 bond election were and still are legal, then S 1147 was completely unnecessary.
So once again the Coeur d’Alene city government has tried to circumvent the law, cut corners, because it’s easier to do it wrong and hope you won’t get caught than it is to be diligent in your duty and honest with the citizens.
But then, this is Idaho. Esto perpetua corruptam.
Troy “hatched” this idea ten years ago, yet it is finally brought to the public? Doesn’t he present bond issues to the legal department and the bond attorney prior to going ahead and submitting them to the public? If so, did the attorneys approve the bond as written? Hopefully, this is not another issue where the excuse is we have always done it this way.
Comment by Susie Snedaker — April 14, 2015 @ 9:06 am
I asked Troy Tymesen, the CDA finance director, specifically about the legality issues you have cited when he and a delegation of city and fire administrators and employees made a presentation on the proposed bond to the CDA Chamber Public Policy Committee on March 17, 2015. His response to me was that their bond counsel said the proposal presented no legal problems. I cited the fact that the change in law (S-1147) they sought to make it legal was not enacted and therefore the bonding authority allowed in Idaho Code 50-1019 did not extend to the police expenditures for bonding. His reply again was that their bond counsel said they were legal.
Can I come to any conclusion other than, I was lied to?
I hope that the bond election will be set aside until these issues are settled.
Comment by Gary Ingram — April 14, 2015 @ 2:00 pm
Susie and Gary,
I don’t know who the City’s bond counsel is.
The City’s action to quickly and quietly get CYA legislation passed is certainly a strong indicator that the City was uncertain about the legality of its position. If I were on the City Council, I would no longer accept a vague assurance from either Gridley or Tymesen on this or any other matter that some unnamed attorney said everything was okay; I would want to be provided with the specific authorizing statute or controlling case law from an Idaho court.
The City proposed to amend the existing wording of subsection 6 to generally include both fire and police. It goes beyond “police cars” and includes the purchase of building sites, buildings and suitable equipment and apparatus to provide fire and police protection. The City proposed this legislative amendment in conjunction with its pitching the May 9 “public safety” bond. It seems to me if the City had stronger legal authority to support its position of including police in the bond, it would not have sought emergency relief from the Legislature.
Comment by Bill — April 14, 2015 @ 4:49 pm
Another issue of interest to me is the percentage of the bond monies that will be siphoned to lcdc over the term of the bond. Did Troy happen to mention this little issue to the city? I would like to know the percentage and approximate amount that lcdc will be given. I am not holding my breath waiting for the city to divulge the estimate.
Comment by Susie Snedaker — April 14, 2015 @ 6:05 pm
Susie,
That’s a great question. We’ll probably never know, because the City has become adept at moving money around until it is no longer attributable and traceable to its original source or purpose.
Comment by Bill — April 14, 2015 @ 7:22 pm
Brian Kane, Deputy Attorney General, responded to a request from Senator Steve Vick about whether or not the levy election ballot must disclose the tax amount that will be diverted to the city’s urban renewal agency, LCDC. Kane’s response was hinged on a lot of, “it depends”. There may or may not be a balance left to allocate and he concluded, “…there is no current statutory requirement to disclose whether taxes will be or may be shared with an urban renewal district…”.
So. I guess the public will never know if taxpayers will be paying taxes on borrowed money for LCDC. But someone at the city certainly knows, if only they will tell us.
This, along with all the subterfuge about pumping up the bond amount for illegal police purchases makes it hard to justify a yes vote on this 6 million bond.
Comment by Gary Ingram — April 14, 2015 @ 9:08 pm
Gary,
“Subterfuge” is exactly the right word.
Readers should look at the City’s online PowerPoint presentation to City Council closely for both what is there and what is not there.
What is there: An explicit statement that it will be a general obligation bond.
What is not there: A reference to the specific state statute (Idaho Code § 50-1019 which unambiguously lists exactly the only purposes for which bond money may be spent. The law only mentions “fire;” there is no specific reference to “police” or even a broader reference to “public safety.”
What is there: An explicit declaration the City intends to spend approximately $925,000 for police expenditures, expenditures for which there is no authority stated in Idaho Code § 50-1019.
What is there: A revelation that the 2005 GO bond “Paid off … Police Station.” What isn’t there but what was included in the City’s 2005 GO bond was this:
So in 2005, it appears the City violated the law then, too. Only then, they apparently got away with it. (Thus, the Idaho defense “We’ve always done it that way, so it must be legal.” The corollary to that is, “You didn’t catch us, therefore it must be legal.”)
This year, 2015, it appears someone at City Hall actually took the highly unusual step of reading the law. My guess is that it was City Administrator Jim Hammond, because it’s pretty clear anyone who was there in 2005 was not inclined to read it and more importantly, follow it. If that is so, then where Hammond erred could have been in assuming that any other officials at Coeur d’Alene City Hall would eagerly choose to follow the law (if they even bothered to make themselves aware of it). Hence, the pitch to Siddoway to quickly (emergency provision) and quietly get the law changed to make the Coeur d’Alene City administration appear to be what is is not: honest with the citizens.
Now that the “change the law” flim-flam has failed, we wonder what the City’s Plan B will be? Trot out some attorney who assures the public that it’s all legal and there’s nothing to see here? Run a series of “news” articles in the local skews paper promoting the bond issue but carefully omitting any reference to the police? Maybe enlist the echo chamber of commerce to parrot back whatever the City wants it to parrot back? Maybe get the LCDC to magnanimously give taxpayer money to the City to make up the difference, then quietly divert some of the bond proceeds to pay back the LCDC (assuming the bond passes)?
Comment by Bill — April 15, 2015 @ 7:36 am
Thank you for showing your interest in the City’s public safety bond.
* The primary purpose of the bond is to replace our fire equipment and to purchase a new truck for Station 4 when it goes online sometime in the future. This purchase makes up the majority of the cost, nearly $4,500,000
* The mobile command center is intended for joint use between fire and police. I recognize this item is a point of contention. Bond counsel (Danielle Quade) has assured the City that this is an allowed purchase under current code.
* The Fire/PD storage facility and carport for the police vehicles is allowed under IC 50-1019(9), as stated in the staff report presented to Council.
* No money from the bond goes to LCDC, but the bond levy rate is affected by the URDs. Funds collected in a URD are split between the taxing entities and LCDC just as they are for all property taxes (minus school levies) in that district.
I’d be happy to clarify any other issues or answer questions as best I can. I would further suggest attending a City Council meeting and expressing your concerns there, as that would allow the answers to become part of the public record.
Comment by Dan Gookin — April 15, 2015 @ 11:32 am
Dan,
Thank you. I’m not buying it.
My reason is simple: Remember Boopsie’s Bunker in the Park?
The City told us that it, too, would be jointly used by the police and fire department. The City deceived us then, and now you’re trying to do it again. The only question I have now is, what will the next lie from the City be? I wonder if Coeur d’Alene is the only city in Idaho with a mayor and council that looks for ways to evade the law?
Comment by Bill — April 15, 2015 @ 12:35 pm
Like Captain Barbossa said in Pirates of the Caribbean, “The code is more… guidelines.” This seems to apply to our public ‘servants’ as well.
Comment by JSmetal — April 16, 2015 @ 11:04 am
JSmetal–Now that is just plain spot-on.
Bill—Sadly, when I googled ‘circumvent’ and I quickly located an Idaho S.Ct. decision that indicates that the city is not the only gov’t entity that looks for ways to evade the law. In Idaho Conservation League, Inc. v. Idaho State Dept. of Agriculture [ISDA], 143 Idaho 366 (2006)the Idaho S.Ct stated (page 369):
“We are not persuaded by ISDA’s attempts to circumvent these statutes requiring public disclosure by its argument that because the NMPs are no longer housed with ISDA, ISDA no longer has a duty to make the records available to the public.”
Comment by Tributary — April 16, 2015 @ 1:55 pm