“I just believe in fairness, and fair is fair. It is
exceedingly unfair to change the rules for an election during the
election.”

That was City Commissioner Randy Leonard during a January 9 city
council meeting, when the council was discussing a special election to
replace outgoing Commissioner Erik Sten. At issue? Whether to craft
special public financing rules to go along with the special
election.

Fast forward to this week, when Leonard and Mayor Tom Potter want
to, well, change the rules for an election, during the
election.

Last Wednesday, March 5, the council approved an ordinance that
formally directs Auditor Gary Blackmer to treat the special election
the same as a regular election, for the purposes of public financing.
That’s essentially what the auditor has already been doing in the
absence of special rules: Jim Middaugh qualified for public
funds in the race by meeting the same requirements and deadlines as
candidates for a second, regular open seat.

At issue is what happens if Middaugh makes it through the May 20
primary. Should he get $200,000 for a runoff—like
candidates in a regular election do—even though the runoff for
that seat is less than two months later?

“The council passed this ordinance last week; it grants [Voter Owned
Elections or VOE] candidates in a greatly compressed special election
the same level of funding VOE candidates receive in a regular
election,” Potter wrote to his colleagues, requesting a reconsideration
of last week’s vote. “I believe the community’s support of VOE rests on
its continued perception of the system’s fairness and fiscal
responsibility.”

Leonard sent a note to Blackmer on Saturday, March 8: “It would be
virtually impossible for a nonparticipating candidate to raise
that amount of money in that compressed time period,” he wrote. “If
that is the effect of what we adopted last week, I am feeling
somewhat misled. I certainly would have raised concerns
with the striking unfairness of the time table I have laid out here if
I had understood what the implications were of the changes we were
making.”

Is it unfair that Middaugh may get $200,000 soon after the May 20
primary, and his main opponent, Nick Fish, would have to hit the phones
hard to catch up, should they both make it through the primary? Maybe.
Very possibly, even.

But the issue was raised on January 9, before anyone filed to run
for the seat. The council had a chance to make it clear what the public
financing rules were before anyone decided whether or not to
pursue the funding. Instead—and largely on Leonard’s strong
words—the council declined to get involved.

Readdressing it now, especially at the urging of a council member
who’s endorsed the privately funded frontrunner (Leonard is in Fish’s
corner), is just as unfair. Or, as Leonard said back then: “It’s bad
public policy to do anything that even remotely looks like we are
somehow participating in an election as a council, politically. [It]
calls into question the fairness of the election.”