The Marshall County Election Board members heard from Nicole Haskins Wednesday morning who explained her concerns with several campaign finance reports filed in 2020 and 2022.
She pointed to incumbent elected officials and current candidates in this year’s election. She discussed the campaign finance report for four candidates, Bill Githens, Jesse Bohannon, Tim Harman, and William Patterson who filed as a pack known as Better Government Hears People in 2020. She said that it appears that each candidate claimed all in-kind contributions to individual campaigns and it should have been split between each candidate. She claimed that the reports were defective as it appeared that four times the amount was spent on local elections.
Harman was present and commented that, if anything, they were over-reporting and being as transparent as possible. Bohannon said the reports were reviewed by all involved and will correct errors as needed.
She also mentioned the campaign finance reports for Mandy Campbell and Steve Harper that did not have expenditure codes that were properly reported so she claimed the reports were defective.
Haskins said William Patterson disbanded his 2020 committee with a zero balance and when he reopened it in 2022 she claimed there was a beginning balance of which there is no record of its origin.
Haskins also pointed to Commissioner District 1 candidate Trend Weldy’s campaign finance report in that he did not separate campaign contributions and was missing coding on his report. She said it appeared Commissioner District 1 candidate Stan Klotz did not disclose bank information that would hold campaign contributions on his report.
Additionally, Haskins said corporate contributions from the same company met the monetary threshold to contribute to local candidates, Nicole Cox and Deb Johnson, and also to Better Government Hears People and were not earmarked for specific campaigns.
After hearing the details, the board members agreed to review the information and look at all of the reports and compare against state statutes. They also agreed to contact all candidates and committees with errors to correct them which could lead to hearings, if determined as necessary.
