Ronayne Rebuts Three “Defenses” of Schaunaman’s Conflict of Interest

Attorney and city councilman Rob Ronayne rebuts three key points that local Republicans have been using to distract from rookie Mayor Travis Schaunaman’s blatant conflict of interest in publicly lobbying to win a taxpayer-funded contract to redesign Aberdeen’s logo and slogan.

First, Ronayne counters the argument offered by Senator Al Novstrup (R-3/Aberdeen)—who was joined by Rep. Carl Perry (R-3/Aberdeen) and Groton’s Republican city attorney Drew Johnson at Monday’s council meeting to flack for Schaunaman—that loose state ethics laws allow Schaunaman to bid for the publicly funded contract:

“Sen. Novstrup and Mr. Johnson were both right that the statute is designed to curb misbehavior by various state officials,” Ronayne wrote in the email. “Neither of them apparently reviewed our City Home Rule Charter. What is unique about our charter, and is important in this situation, is that by reference our charter adopts this stricter standard by providing, ‘Municipal officials shall be, at a minimum be [sic] restricted from conflict of interest to the same extent that state public officials are bound by state law; provided however, that the city council may adopt an ordinance setting a stricter standard.’ I am not aware that any other city has applied these prohibitions to their municipal officials, so it not surprising that they were both unaware of it.

“The argument the mayor and his supporters have been making is that this conduct is permitted under the looser standard that the Legislature has enacted for municipalities,” Ronayne added. “What they have not argued is that it is right for a city lawmaker to contract to provide services to the city.”

“I think our citizens expect us to carefully administer city funds, not use city tax dollars to pay ourselves. We can ethically govern the city and oversee its finances, or we can contract and provide goods and services to the city. We cannot do both. We should not try to do both,” he said [Shannon Marvel, “Ronayne Explains Interpretation of Conflict-of-Interest Violations for City Officials {paywall},” Aberdeen American News, 2019.09.13].

In a separate column, Ronayne dismisses the sleazy fiction that Schaunaman with clean conscience bid for a publicly funded contract as long as our tax dollars are handed to and laundered by the quasi-private Chamber of Commerce:

It has been argued that where the city provides grants to various trusted agencies, being compensated with this tax money is acceptable because the tax monies are paid by the city to these agencies, and then doled out by them to others. I am not persuaded by this technicality. In the law, we frequently say that one cannot do indirectly what one is prohibited from doing directly.

…Even if these payments were deemed by a court to be technically legal, recycling of tax money through city-supported agencies or city contractors creates an appearance of corruption even where everyone is acting ethically. Allowing a city official to profit from city tax money is simply not good government. We can and should do better [Rob Ronayne, “Conflict Standard Under City Charter Is High,” Aberdeen American News, 2019.09.14].

Finally, Ronayne defuses the false equivalency some observers have used to claim that Ronayne has a conflict of interest as well in lawyering for Schaunaman’s logo-redesign competitor, Troy McQuillen. Ronayne points out that McQuillen is not his client and has not availed himself of Ronayne’s services for over ten years:

…a supporter of the mayor recently charged that a competitor of the mayor is paying me or my law firm to expose the mayor’s conflict. If true, that, of course, would be clearly unethical. While I have done legal work for one of the mayor’s competitors, our last billing to him or his company was over a decade ago. This is not an active client. I am not being compensated on this issue other than by my salary as a city councilor. Our citizenry has the right to be certain that the council is enforcing ethics laws and doing so for the right reason [Ronayne, 2019.09.14].

The Aberdeen City Council meets this afternoon at 4 p.m. to work publicly on revising the City Charter. Watch for amendments from Mayor Schaunaman recommending we strike Section 7 on conflicts of interest.