Ethics panel members decry revisions

AUGUSTA – Revisions in the law that regulates Maine’s Ethics Commission have upset some members so much they are talking about quitting the election-oversight panel.

Commissioner Linda Cronkhite said legislators’ actions could undermine the intent of the Maine Clean Elections Act, the state law that is aimed at reducing campaign spending through a public financing system.

Ethics commissioners asked for changes in the law that would give them more flexibility in issuing fines for election law violations. But Cronkhite, accusing lawmakers of “underhanded, behind-the-back maneuvers,” said changes that evolved went well beyond the scope of what the commissioners wanted.

“The whole attempt was to depoliticize the Ethics Commission, and now we’re putting it right back in the political arena,” Cronkhite said. “I just want the people of the state to know what they’re getting.”

Cronkhite said she and other members of what is formally known as the Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices are considering resigning.

Before lawmakers adjourned last week, they changed the process for appointing commission members by a governor’s appointment to a governor’s choice from lists submitted by legislative leaders and the public.

Cronkhite says that returns power to oversee legislative candidates to the Legislature.

The bill also requires the commission to meet or hold telephone conferences during the 28 days before an election within 24 hours of complaints filed against candidates.

The commission is also required to meet monthly, rather than four times a year.

Gov. Angus King is expected to sign the bill, said his chief of staff, Kay Rand. Rand added that she tried to change some of the provisions to which the commission members objected most strongly.

Rep. John Tuttle Jr., House chairman of the Legal and Veterans Affairs Committee, said he sought to slow down the legislation and keep the commission better informed on changes that were being made.

Tuttle, D-Sanford, said lawmakers were so upset with the commission because of the thousands of dollars in penalties it levied during the last year that many of them were prepared to slash its power.

Candidates complained that they called the commission offices in the weeks before the election seeking help to comply with the law, but could not get through or could not get the help they needed, said Tuttle. Then they were fined.