From San Diego City Attorney Jan Goldsmith…
In a KUSI interview yesterday morning, Mayor Bob Filner crossed the line, alleging that members of the City Council and I had been “bought off” by hoteliers in the TMD matter. This is a very serious allegation of criminal conduct, and it is baseless and defamatory.
KUSI also carried a segment at 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. yesterday which reiterated the Mayor’s accusations and included my response, which you can see here.
Accusations such as this against the City Council and the City Attorney should have no place in a civilized, public-policy discussion. I will have more to say about it in the future.
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Follow-up from Goldsmith, later in the day…
KPBS did a work-up of hotel related contributions:
“Jan Goldsmith, who has made rulings in this, has got tens of thousands of dollars from people who are on the TMD board and the major hoteliers who passed this thing,” Filner said. “He didn’t have a campaign for election, so what are they giving him money for? It’s simple, they want his rulings on their behalf.”
inewsource
Hotelier donations to the city attorney and city councilmembers.
But inewsource, KPBS’ partner on the investigations desk, examined the campaign contributions to these candidates from hoteliers and TMD board members since 2007 and found no individual candidate received “tens of thousands of dollars.” Councilmembers Sherri Lightner, Kevin Faulconer and Lorie Zapf each received more than $10,000 and Goldsmith received at least $12,000 between his two campaigns. (See table for numbers.)
Goldsmith and council President Todd Gloria were reelected in November without opposition.
“Todd Gloria did not have a campaign, and he got thousands of dollars from the people who are responsible for this contract today,” Filner continued. “Half of the council — I’m sure, I have not looked at those figures, but I bet it’s tens of thousands of dollars and up. What are they doing? Why are they giving this money? So they can get this kind of shady deal approved.”
http://www.kpbs.org/news/2013/mar/28/mayor-city-attorney-dispute-expands-criminal-accus/