Auditor: BREAKING - Taylor (R) Sought Legislative Action for Personal Gain

This is big. The Ohio Democratic Party has unearthed appalling evidence of self-dealing on the part of auditor candidate Rep. Mary Taylor (R-Green).

In my summary of statewide races earlier today I reported that Taylor wrote a letter to her Republican colleagues in the General Assembly last year, pointing out that three major GOP campaign donors favored legislative action to approve funding for the Global Business Institute at the University of Akron. Those donors rewarded Taylor with $10,000 in contributions after she wrote the letter. Here are details from the Columbus Dispatch article:

"Please take note that several of the Ohio Republican Party’s biggest supporters (W.R. Timken Jr., of Timken; Stanley C. Gault; and Gary L. Taylor, of InfoCision Management Corporation) have written requesting continued funding for this program," [Taylor] wrote in a March 30, 2005, letter to fellow legislators.

[She] was referring to funding in the state budget for the University of Akron’s Institute for Global Business. In June 2005, when the General Assembly approved the two-year state budget, it included $900,000 for the program. The original House version of the budget provided no funding.

Now it has been learned that Welty Construction, a company owned by Taylor and her husband, shared in a $331,000 contract to provide contruction management services for an expansion of the Global Business Institute building. This information is contained in a July 9, 2003 memorandum by the University of Akron Board of Trustees. Representative Taylor did not disclose her financial relationship with the Global Business Institute while advocating for its funding.

The Ohio Democratic Party points out that this conduct appears to violate two provisions of the legislature's ethical guidelines:

IMPROPER INFLUENCE – Section 7A, General Assembly’s Legislative Code of Ethics

No member…of the General Assembly…shall use or attempt to use…the authority of influence of the member’s or employee’s office…to secure anything of value or the promise or offer of anything of value…as to manifest a substantial and improper influence upon the member…

IMPROPER INDUCEMENT – Section 11, General Assembly’s Legislative Code of Ethics

If any person attempts to induce a member of employee of or candidate for the General Assembly or employee of any legislative agency to violate any provision of this Code of Ethics, the member, employee or candidate shall report the matter to the Joint Legislative Ethics Committee.

“Mary Taylor is sinking deeper and deeper into the muck of Ohio’s Republican scandals,” said Ohio Democratic Party Chair Chris Redfern. “Taylor doesn’t have the fortitude to even audit her own inappropriate official actions. She has a lot of explaining to do before Ohio voters should even think about letting her near the state’s checkbook. The last thing Ohio needs is four more years of investigations.”

UPDATE: Coverage in the Columbus Dispatch is here, on Buckeye State Blog here.