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31 Jul

San Bernardino County Voters Can Still Dissolve Eminent Domain JPA

I am on finance TV show the Keiser Report today reporting from So-Cal’s Inland Empire about a private finance firm, Mortgage Resolution Partners, using San Bernardino County’s CEO Greg Devereaux as their guinea pig in a controversial eminent domain housing plan. A plan never attempted before that could effect future borrowing rates hurting local homeowners yet also gives them the chance to put to screws to Wall Street investors who have them in a debt death spiral. There are so many what-ifs to using eminent domain this way and miss information is being spun by both parties. After being on the ground in the county for a month here’s a few observations I think residents need to pay attention to.

First your local papers, The Sun, Press Enterprise, and even the LA Times just don’t have local reporters covering the story with the industry knowledge to understand how high-finance works so they can ask smart questions and get you the set of facts you need to make a decision. One thing’s for sure the current plan is all about those who know about how high-finance works trying to take advantage of those who don’t for a fat profit. Lefty politicians will tout its merits without reading the details of the plan and MRP has even hired a professor, Robert Hockett of Cornell, to spout out feel good expert sentences to reporters that are often inaccurate.

I get worried for readers when we see the LA Times housing reporter write, “Hockett has said that using eminent domain to seize underwater mortgages that have been securitized makes sense because often those mortgages can’t be sold at market value for legal reasons. Often, those loans must be sold at face value — a higher price — because of the contracts governing them.”

That sentence just isn’t true. The LA Times could have called over to the mortgage bond experts at SIFMA who explained, “No, he’s wrong, because the loans generally can’t be sold at all at the whim of the trustee prior to default. At whatever price.” Asset back traders confirmed mortgage bond trustees do sell loans out of the securities below face value, not often, but it happens.

A few national finance reporters and publications are trying to sort out the facts but MRP and the County just keep claiming they havn’t finalized anything – which kind of sound likes BS to me. I’d suggest reading Felix Salmon and Matt Goldstein at Reuters along with a group of high finance expert opinions Marc Hochstein has put together over at American Banker’s Bank Think to get your arms around the pros and cons of MRP’s home protection plan. On Max Keiser’s show I was referencing some really interesting points by Andrew Kahr, a banking industry veteran and opinion columnist for BankThink. Kahr spoke out against his own kind (Bankers) on why eminent domain could work but not the way MRP has planned it for San Bernardino. He even scolded mortgage investor groups for using fear of breaking contract law as the evil of all constitutional evils.

Today I also talked with Max Keiser about the County possibly violating California’s Brown Act. The notion that elected officials felt they needed to walk a grey line and break public trust to get their joint protection agency off the ground tells us a lot in this saga. With Paul Herrera, government affairs director for San Bernardino-area realtors association, now telling me that elected county board supervisors came to him all excited about the plan starting on February 15th – two months before the first public hearing in April – it’s getting clear the County felt it needed to meet in secret first to escape the wrath of deep pocket investor groups who‘d use the media to communicate all the scary pitfalls of this plan. And if reporters can’t get emails and meeting notes via FOIA request because the towns say they don’t have any, than MRP was also likely planning how they communicate (no emails) to keep their negotiations with San Bernardino County under wraps.

David Wert, spokesperson for San Bernardino County , swears to me the County doesn’t want to execute a plan that benefits one set of wealth investors over another and only helps one group of homeowners with jumbo loans who still have good credit. But local realtor groups don’t trust that. Bottom line is there is still time to reverse the formation of the Joint Protection Agency – the newly formed legal body run by Devereaux that is using county resources (lawyers and administrators) to make decisions on eminent domain. Herrera says if residents don’t want the plan they need to speak with their five elected board supervisors to get at least three to vote for dissolution of the JPA. Towns already signed on like Fontana and Ontario don’t have the money to fund a JPA on their own (lawyers are expensive) so it’s really at the feet of the County to pull this off–without a JPA they can‘t do the plan. Of course another idea is to let the JPA work through alternate plan details like including defaulting homeowners in the pool of loans MRP would buy. Even if they did that residents still better do their own research to understand on how the effects of counties using rule of law to break mortgage contracts could hurt them. They also need answers on any kind of gift tax they would have to pay if they got a principle reduction.

The reality is by using eminent domain this way what residents really have is a chance for an informed public to take control away from the banks and have a small role in redirecting their housing hell hole. And as I said on TV today if the banks had modified loan principles or at least written down these underwater loans to real market value years ago they might not be facing a possible take over by city governments that would hit their balance sheets with a big fat loss. I’d be watching if the people of San Bernardino County start showing up at public meetings to try and move the plan in a different direction through a collective vote or if a few high finance vets keep rolling along to pillage municipals.

8 Comments
13 Jul

Did San Bernardino County Violate California’s Brown Act in Eminent Domain Talks?

This story has been updated with comments from San Bernardino County

Groups that represent the interest of mortgage bond investors have been caught off guard by a move San Bernardino County, Ca might make to use eminent domain to buy underwater mortgages with the help of wealthy private investors and a San Francisco based venture capitalist firm. Today the Southern California County held it’s first meeting with public comments on the subject and Greg Devourex, county CEO, started the meeting stating they’ve been working to address the issue openly with the community and ideas will be thoroughly vetted in public. But concerned residents and local real estate brokers say they only heard about the plan through press reports last month nor have they actually seen any plan proposals.

Representative of powerful financial investor groups like SIFMA and the Association of Mortgage Investors told me the newly formed joint protection agency hasn’t come to them for viewpoints or research on how this would affect mortgage investors, borrowing rates in their area, or the securitization market. SIFMA has clients like PIMCO and Blackrock who’ve bought billions of residential mortgage securities for investors and even pension funds that could be effected by the plan. They clearly have a role to lobby for only one of the players the plan could affect but they also have deep industry research and data to help elected officials, in one of California’s lower to mid income areas, make informed decisions. I found it interesting that Devourex, or city officials from Fontana and Ontario who also want to use the plan, didn’t think these industry groups were worth speaking with. It wasn’t until the industry groups proactively sent letters of concern that a special public hearing magically happen.

But these out-of-state players aren’t the only ones shut out of the decision-making process. Even groups like the Inland Valleys (San Bernardino area) Association of Realtors have tried to get officials to explain the request for proposal procedure the county used to engage in contract talks with the private investors, Mortgage Resolution Partners, but they’re getting stonewalled. One agency that expressed concern over the eminent domain plan said cities like Fontana responded to a Freedom of Information request saying they didn’t keep documents of their discussions to work with MRP so they couldn‘t honor the FOI request. Fontana city council did not respond for comment. This could bring up questions about the cities violating the Brown Act. A California legislation passed in the 50’s to prohibit secret meetings of official bodies.
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But it looks the Matt Goldstein, a pretty good Reuters investigative reporter, has done the leg work for those left questioning how long this new player, MRP, has been working to get the ear and interest of city officials. Interest in a plan that fellow Reuters financial blogger Felix Salmon explains is somewhat greedy and not a valid use of eminent domain. Goldstein’s report says according to public record Reuters got a hold of, Greg Devourex and his San Bernardino County team started talking to MRP in January. On February 9th they even signed a non-disclosure with MRP saying they’d keep the talks private. Goldstein reports it wasn’t until the County thought they might really want to do the plan that they let the public know what was on the agenda. The fact that it took them about six months to inform the public is kind of alarming and even now residents I’ve interviewed still don’t really know how the plan would work because the county isn’t sharing a lot of informed details of what they’ve labeled the ‘home ownership protection plan’.

Multiple industry professionals I spoke with today who were not ready to comment publicly felt there’s been some questionable back room dealing and idea sharing to get the process along this far.

Groups like SIFMA also prepared public comments for the hearing but very few who attended got past the 2-3 minute limit to finish their thoughts. The whole meeting lasted only 36 minutes and there was no discussion or rebuttal from the likes of Deveraux’s team.

SIFMA’s argument against the plan, while obviously concerned first for the mortgage investors, did bring up an interesting concern for homeowners who might take part in the plan. Will they be ready to pay taxes on debt relief if the IRS comes after them and the tax break temporarily in place goes away? Say a homeowner who is paying on their mortgage in an underwater home that isn’t government insured now ( we think this is MRP’s target customer) gets a $100,000 principle modification; does the homeowner have enough cash saved to pay tax on that little gift? Gift tax can be a pretty steep rate.

The other concern dissidents of the plan, like local realtors from the mountain resort of Crestline, Ca, expressed was this plan would wipe out local firms that are trying to do refi’s for San Bernardino County home owners. Remember MRP doesn’t want the delinquent loans, they want the ones that are still paying but underwater in value. Of course if local banks/lenders had moved faster to actually reduce principle on So-Cal‘s underwater homes (a tough economic decision because it lowers the assets on their balance sheet) the county of San Bernardino likely wouldn’t have even considered an extreme move like trying to use eminent domain on personal property that isn’t going to used for public projects.

This plan is going to get a lot of press on why it’s a ‘disastrous idea’ for long-term economic reasons and violations to basic contract law. A few lefty congress people like Rep Brad Miller will voice reasons why it should work without giving any stats or details to support his ideas. But the short-term story is whether the Joint Protection Agency even started the process legally and with transparency for the residents who they claim they’re trying to help? That’s the story local California reporters should be on but at least a well-known national reporter like Matt Goldstein, who has likely never been to the Inland Empire, got the news out.

UPDATE 7-17-12: David Wert, public relations for San Bernardino County, told me the talks with MRP actually began as far back as October. Reuters reported they began in January because that’s as far back as they requested county call logs. That means they didn’t sign the non-disclosure agreement with MRP for about 3 months. The timeline of when the talks started with MRP before the idea of forming the JPA was announced is important to industry observes who questioned if the County violated the Brown Act. Wert says the County CEO is an appointed position, not elected, so he is not subject to holding all meeting in public like the Board of supervisors. Wert flat said he doesn’t think Devourex did anything in secret but will continue to sign non-disclosures with private firms when an idea to help the county is presented to him so that intellectual property is protected. Wert expressed frustration with the media’s coverage on when the County CEO informed the public about the idea to use eminent domain for their housing problem and said this is nothing more than a smear campaign by the investment community. He believes once the idea of forming the JPA was first mentioned at an April public board meeting, that local press attended, the county did its job to start open communication with the public.

NetNet-he thinks they followed the books regarding the Brown Act but since local press didn’t pick up on the importance of using eminent domain in this knew way and the preceived risk it could place on the mortage investors and constitutional/contract law the public feels missinformed.

In a way he has a point – it wasn’t till my peers in the national media who are schooled in high finance caught on to what was going on (via calls from their mortgage investor/trader sources) and printed stories calling the plan a scheme did the Republican minded locals (and realtors) get restless and start to voice concern.

The County thinks there is a lot of miss-information getting printed about MRP’s plan because the County and MRP haven’t finalized anything yet. But speculation about how some of the details that have been shared work is simply part of the role of journalism. Question, analyze, share what you know, and let the reader decided – that’s our job. As San Bernardino County moves along in the process, it’s important all ideas and plan details are openly discussed and published. I’d expected San Bernardino to have a special website up soon to data dump everything they have on the possibility of the Home Protection Program. Unfortunately, most residents still aren’t likely to understand the impact of taking money off the table from one investor group and giving it to another in effort to modify underwater homes until the County starts to get their arms around the risks also. Risk San Bernardino County residents might be willing to take because at the end of the day having the chance to show Wall Street some pain might be enough of a motive – regardless of the financial after effects.

2 Comments
5 Jun

New Canaan Dems Pick Unemployed Man for 125th seat Congressional Run

New Canaan democrats seem to have chosen a shiny polished Columbia grad, Mark Robbins, to make a run for the State congressional seat. It’s a chance to unseat the GOP stronghold Rep. John Hetherington had for so many years and Robbins credentials on paper, including time served on New Canaan’s long range planning board, looks like he could be a contender against the GOP’s man Tom O’Dea. Except the Dem written press release announcing his candidacy left out a few facts.

According to court records Robbins, who’s divorced with one child, has been on unemployment. The small real estate and energy consulting firm he owned was sold to a New York firm that went out of business; so he’s been collecting the max ($500ish) you can get from the state of New York’s unemployment fund. I heard Robbins tell a Stamford court clerk last month that the unemployment payments will actually run out soon so he’s been working the family court justice system to get his child support reduced. Financial affidavits filed in court show Robbins was paying $1540 a month of child support in 2009 but as of last month it has been temporarily reduced to only $111 a week. His income report stated in February he was bringing in $715 gross weekly but now it’s only $528 a week. The ex-wife Jackie, who is remarried, isn’t too keen on the kid care drop and filed her own motions asking for proof of Robbins looking for a job. Her court filings this year also state Robbins won’t pay for non-reimbursed medical expenses, as the parenting plan calls for, nor his son’s extra-curricular activities.

The job market for new building and energy friendly LEED housing is still an economic struggle and with his business apparently nonexistent these days this congressional run reads like Robbins is doing it for hopes of a paid job or the campaign might be a way to pick up a few clients. Except when I asked Ginny Apy, New Canaan Democrat Town Chair, about how Robbins was selected she told me the local Dems actually sought Robbins out for the congressional job. It’s unclear what kind of fact checking the Dems do but Dems involved in the selection told me Robbins at least warned them he was having ‘some difficulty’ with child support right now and clearly that wasn’t an issue for them.

Robbin’s press release and the Dem quotes that announced his run were chalk full of praise about his work in environmental planning but the need for that service in developed towns like New Canaan and Wilton seems slim. So what’s the Dems angle here? If you volunteer for town boards that makes you a hot contender or I have to wonder if it was that difficult to find someone who wanted to run against a seat predominately held by Republicans for years?

Editor’s Note: None of the local New Canaan or Wilton papers bothered to go down to Stamford family court and research this new political man on the scene Mark Robbins. I find it bothersome when they can’t do some simple research and offer local readers insight instead of rewriting press releases and calling it news.

1 Comment
19 Mar

O’Hora’s New Canaan GOP Leadership is still ‘My Way or The Highway’

UPDATE 4.20.12: CT GOP Executive Director Brian Cafferelli wrote to former NCRTC executive Roy Abramowitz this week informing him the State Central GOP wasn’t going to form a dispute committee to investigate the methods O’Hora used to not fill a vacant RTC seat last month.Abramowitz had filed a complaint in March with State Central after O’Hora wouldn’t let RTC members vote on him filling the vacant seat. A former NCRTC member who had encouraged Abramowitz to file the complaint said upon reading Cafferelli’s letter the State GOP is understaffed these days and doesn’t have the bandwidth to deal with local RTC disputes. Abramowitz who was visibly dishearten by the lack of CT GOP action told other New Canaan Republicans in an email this week, “I now understand why the Democrats control this state. We have leadership without backbone upstate.” The outspoken former RTC treasure was voted to be a State GOP delegate last month and said he’ll continue to serve that role.

Original Text
The red-faced chairman of the New Canaan Republican Town Committee, James O’Hora, was re-elected unopposed last week. Apparently no one else would do the volunteer job which involves political hob-knobbing with other people’s money. O’Hora who was the subject of a campaign finance violation story I previously reported, showed he would continue the same style of leadership this term – which means making up rules to fit his agenda best.

After Wall Streeter Patrick Swearingen backed out of taking his new seat on the NCRTC, a week before confirmation, O’Hora was faced with his nemesis, RTC Treasurer Roy Abramowitz, being inline to fill the vacant seat. A notion O’Hora apparently couldn’t stomach because instead of following an election protocol he set precedent on; he just rallied his buddies (newly elected RTC members) to come up with a game plan to make sure Abramowitz wasn’t back on the RTC challenging the way he blew through about $80,000 in donated GOP funds. Why Swearingen suddenly bailed on the job using a year old Dodd-Frank conflict of interest excuse is kind of odd but maybe he just didn’t want to be part of O’Hora’s gavel slamming leadership.

The local paper got wind of the tussle and reported some of the facts around O’Hora’s move to allow Betty Lovastick to take the vacant sent because she was next in line from the January GOP caucus vote. But Lovastick apparently didn’t want to have anything to do with a RTC run by O’Hora and wouldn’t accept the seat. The next candidate with the highest votes after Lovastick was none other than Abramowitz.

Abramowitz, who knew O’Hora as gunning to keep him out of the RTC, attended the March 12th meeting as the Treasurer of the then-seated NCRTC to deliver his last executive spending report. The meeting was also a place where newly elected RTC members were suppose to be sworn in. But instead it turned into a pissing match of old v. new RTC members trying to determine how the vacant seat would be filled. What the local paper doesn’t come out and explain is O’Hora basically blew Abramowitz off as already being out of office. The Chairman did this when his nemesis tried to move through due process explaining why he should be next in line to take a seat on the new RTC pursuant to O’Hora’s own election protocol that he’d just established by letting Lovastick take the vacant seat. Once again the RTC Chairman wanted to write his own rules making sure his buddies on the new Town Committee would elect the replacement candidate. This magical interpretation of their bylaws suddenly sets up a committee of new RTC members to vote on the vacant seat; basically side-stepping the rest of the town Republicans who’d already voted for RTC members they wanted to represent them. O’Hora told the New Canaan Advertiser, “the new committee would be taking its time and interviewing candidates before voting to fill the seat.”

Which really means O’Hora will ignore the problem till no one is talking about it and then they can fill the seat with someone who’ll fall in line with the O’Hora agenda.

State Central Republican Committee executive Bob Lutts, their rules expert, did offer this detail about the process O’Hora would have to go through if he had moved forward placing Betty or Roy into the seat. “While they might have practiced this in the past there is no set rule on filling vacant seats with candidates who didn’t get the full confirmation votes from the last election. If O’Hora had moved forward with Betty or Roy he would still have to get the majority of the current members at the last RTC meeting to confirm one of them,” said Lutts.

Abramowitz told me he actually tried to call for that vote with the 8 old RTC members present but O’Hora started yelling there would be no vote at the meeting for the vacancy.

O’Hora did not respond for comment for this story.

The New Canaan Advertiser reporter Matt Dalen told Abramowitz he wanted to write ‘a fair piece’ about the vacancy and possible rule violations but I found it odd he didn’t source or call the State’s Republican expert on election law and RTC rules, Bob Lutts. Instead we saw some kind of ‘expert opinion’ from a trusts and estate lawyer, Bill Osterndorf, who’d just buddied-up to O’Hora and got Abramowitz former job as RTC Treasurer. It’s interesting to note O’Hora publicly supported Osterndorf when he ran and lost for probate judge in 2010. The rest of the New Canaan RTC actually didn’t want to publicly support one Republican against the other for probate judge and opposed giving money for an Ostrerndorf endorsement. A move, according to former RTC members, O’Hora was pissed off about.

Abramowitz isn’t the type of person to take much lying down. Republicans have told me it’s too bad there is so much ill will within GOP leadership but I also watched a few encourage Abramowitz to take this up the food chain and file a complaint with the State GOP. Unfortunately none of them would come on the record with their names to publicly denounce O’Hora’s railroading. So now an Article two Section 10 appeal was sent off last night by Abramowitz who now gets to wait and see if the Connecticut Republican State Central Committee takes this situation seriously — or just blows it off as local infighting by a bunch of puffy chest New Canaan egos .

In-kind donations, I previously reported were not properly accounted for under O’Hora’s last term, still haven’t been dealt with says Abramowitz. It will be interesting to see if the new Treasurer uses NCRTC money to make the donations right or follows O’Hora’s prior leadership and figures no one but the local Dems will complain about their consistent finance campaign violations. In addition to that we have a local paper, owned by the town’s Republican treasurer Hersam, that picks and chooses which facts to report—rarely holding New Canaan Republican’s accountable for any miss-conduct. Now if they wanted to step-up their reporting they could look into the current debate on how many of O’Hora’s Hartford cronies he’s trying to comp for the NCRTC’s main fundraising event, the Lincoln Dinner. A fundraiser that O’Hora has now turned into a retirement party for State Rep John Hetherington. I’d be asking why the fancy dinner ticket price went up from $125 to $150 – is Chairman O’Hora expecting wealthy New Canaan Republicans to cover the dinner’s funding shortfall? To me, it sounds like another plan to amp up O’Hora’s personal political piggy bank again, also known as the NCRTC budget.

Why Abramowitz still keeps coming back to the fight –attempting to make local spending fiscally responsible when some of his GOP peers just keep mudslinging his character is beyond me—but I’m sure more than a few New Canaanites seeing him publicly try to voice concerns about his own damn party think it sure is refreshing and fun to watch.

1 Comment
23 Feb

O’Hora’s New Canaan RTC: Party Committee or Private Piggy Bank?

UPDATE 2-26-12: I learned Irene Barrack (NCRTC Secretary) said the committee is getting calls from concerned State Legislators since this story came out. Given the NCRTC is now scrambling to make sure other Republican in-kind donations didn’t go over the $1,000 individual per year limit it makes sense State Reps would be a little worried. It is expected the NCRTC, who is suddenly more aware of campaign finance law, will be writing more checks this week to Republican supporters like Elizabeth DeLuca who gave a little too much between tickets for the 2011 fundraising dinner and campaign posters for town elections.

Original Text
New Canaan’s RTC has blown through cash at the direction of its Chairman, James T. O’Hora, leaving local Republican coffers under budget for fundraising during the 2012 election year. O’Hora who took over Chairmanship in 2010, when Wall Street banker John Ponterotto didn’t want to run again, has used donated funds in ways that lead to serious infighting within the RTC and violations of campaign finance law.

According to a RTC budget report prepared last week by NCRTC treasurer, Roy Abramowitz, there is only $6,122, left in the committee’s bank account for 2012 campaign activities. In the last two years under O’Hora’s leadership eCRIS records show the RTC has spent $80,421 of donated Republican funds; almost double the dollars spent by sister cities Darien and Greenwich. New Canaan’s fundraising powers are one of the strongest among statewide RTC’s so the amount of greenbacks they can shell out to support local Republican officials is often in the $30-$40k range per year. The problem is how cash was spent shows waste and possible personal political gain for James O’Hora.

Image is important for this New Canaan chairman who made sure to set the stage at the beginning of his 2010 leadership. O’Hora used RTC funds to buy a gavel with special RTC Chairman engraving for $95.40. A tool RTC members I spoke with say he uses religiously anytime someone disagrees with him. Long time RTC Secretary Irene Barrack says, “Well his dog ate the handle but yes James still likes to use his gavel.” The State GOP website shows most RTC chairs use their personal email address for Republicans to contact them but at the start of O’Hora’s reign he set up a new email ncrtcchairman@gmail.com in an apparent move to remind people of his new title. Prior NCRTC Chairs didn’t use this type of email. Expense records also show O’Hora felt he needed personalized stationary. Lined envelopes and monogrammed cards with ‘James T. O’Hora’ were purchased from New Canaan’s Milestones for $137.80. His RTC title isn’t listed on the stationary so it could also be used for non committee business.

“O’Hora has used RTC money as his own political piggy bank,” says RTC Treasurer Roy Abramowitz.

Another RTC member who didn’t run in 2012 said, “O’Hora is so untrustworthy. If we were standing in front of a car and he said it was Red I wouldn’t believe him.”

O'Hora Spend Happy RTC Chair

New Canaan RTC Treasurer Abramowitz explained there was usually a group vote on how expenditures were made but O’Hora slipped in a $478.58 bill for a high-end photographer to take professional touched-up photos of Republicans that won elections in 2011. In the past the RTC has used a volunteer photographer, taken photos off a member’s cell phone camera for newspaper stories, or a reporter has taken the photo. In fact, Abramowitz says they had a volunteer photographer in 2011 (who also received a $100 gift certificate to Pine Social) so he refused to pay the bill because he felt it was an excess cost and not board approved. Eventually after repeated pressure from other RTC members and O’Hora he folded and paid the bill in January. New Canaan’s DTC chair Ginny Apy says they don’t pay for newspaper photographers because they use volunteers.

Interviews with past NCRTC members and chairmen show the committee’s mission is to fund local Republicans running for town office and state congressional people in nearby Fairfield County towns but not campaigns for Hartford officials. O’Hora changed that. eCRIS records show he directed the RTC to give $2,000 for Tom Foley’s Governorship campaign and $1,000 for Martha Dean’s Attorney General race.

Abramowitz says, “There were disagreements about these donations but I guess O’Hora wanted to use the funds to get into gold platted political dinners.”

Dinners are prime fundraising tool for Fairfield County Republicans but at the NCRTC’s own Lincoln dinner last year O’Hora only paid $125 for his dinner seat and his wife ate free. Lincoln dinner invites list O’Hora as a Patron donor, which required a $250 per person donation. Abramowitz says O’Hora begged the dinner planners to put his name under the Patron donor because it would look odd if he didn’t give more.

James O’Hora didn’t return a request for comment about his NCRTC spending.

Under, John Ponterotto’s NCRTC leadership the local Republicans raised $25,906 at their Lincoln dinner–a hefty number that built up the coffers for O’Hora’s budget. In the following year O’Hora raised $11,741 but RTC records show the dinner planning cost of around $17,000 remained the same. The RTC secretary said in an interview on February 19th the 2012 Lincoln dinner still doesn’t have a speaker planed or date set. With only $6,100 in the budget it looks like a few wealthy Republicans will have to give the RTC a loan just to get the dinner deposit expenses taken care off. Unfortunately, loans are an in-kind contributions that are limited to $1,000 per person per calendar year.

The use of dollars for ads was also hotly contest at NCRTC meetings. Hersam, the town treasurer, owns the New Canaan Advertiser and has the largest New Canaan circulation. Under O’Hora’s reign $8370 was spent on Advertiser ads. The Hearst owned newspaper, New Canaan News, got $3700 and the AOL online paper Patch only received $450. Full page 4-color ads of local candidates ran but often it was an expense made after the New Canaan Republicans had already won the RTC caucus and didn’t have a democratic challenger.

State GOP executive Bob Lutts told me, “I don’t understood why post-election ads were running and post-election photos were paid for when these New Canaan Republicans had already won. A better use of funds could have been supporting town Republicans in cities with smaller budgets who had serious Democratic contenders.”

A review of O’Hora’s RTC expenses with the GOP’s Lutts showed one alarming campaign finance violation. In the fall of 2010, NCRTC member Christine Ross secured a prime piece of town real estate for campaign office space. Residential builder Dinyar Wadia gave them his empty store front which now houses the high-end restaurant The Tuscan. The over 4,000 sq foot space was advertised for around $56 per sq ft according to a real estate broker I interviewed in 2010 but Wadia the devoted Republican offered the lux space for free. Down the street, in a dumpy smaller retail space, the DTC was forced to pay $4,000 for their campaign headquarters. According to Lutts and state committee spending rules Town Committees have to pay full market rates for campaign space. A slight discount is allowed if the space has been vacant for a while.

“Getting free space is a campaign finance violation with a maximum penalty of twice the amount of the violation,” says Lutts. “The violation is the difference between what they paid and what they should have paid for fair market rent.” The NCRTC had the expensive space for two and half months. Now in-kind donations can be used but the cap is $1,000 and it has to be done by an individual. The retail space the RTC used is owned by a llc – a business cannot make in-kind donations.

O’Hora eventually went to his RTC members and said the NCDTC was complaining about their fancy free space. So some members of the RTC, like Christina Ross, told Abramowitz he should pay Wadia’s property management company John Street Properties $2,000. Records show in January 2011 Wadia’s company got $2000 in NCRTC funds. O’Hora also encouraged some NCRTC members like Barrack and Abramowitz to give a few hundred dollars to Wadia’s favorite charity, Gran Seva, which helps children in India. Still Abramowitz told me no in-kind donation was ever listed for Wadia and he was told by O’Hora and Christina Ross this was a legitimate way to pay for the campaign space. Unfortunately he’s admitted while I was researching this story he learned it wasn’t.

Abramowitz, a seasoned CPA, was O’Hora’s thorn in the side because he consistently tried to push back on what he thought was wasteful spending. He says Christina Ross even voiced the committee should impeach him as treasurer because of his budget push back. Ross didn’t return an email for comment.

“State law shows the treasurer is ultimately the only person who can sign for RTC funds to be released,” says Lutts. “I know of one RTC treasurer who stood up to his whole town committee and flat-out refused to make certain payments.” Twelve members from last year’s New Canaan RTC quit; perhaps they should have stood up and tried to slow down O’Hora piggy bank raid.

New Canaan Republican donors who want to see other ways O’Hora’s RTC spent your money can been seen at www.seec.ct.gov. The eCRIS database list all SEEC20 forms RTC treasurers are required to file. There is even more questionable expenses like the $1,450 spent on name checkers for this summer’s two early voting sessions; a role past RTC’s have always been able to get volunteers for. Along with a few hundred bucks for off-duty NCPD to watch voters roll into town hall.

March 12th is the date the newly elected New Canaan RTC takes office. The vote for their Chairperson, Secretary, Treasure, and Vice-Chair will be interesting to see. Abramowitz, who will be leaving his Treasure position because he was voted out of the RTC, has already sent emails this month calling for the need to “Impeach O’Hora”. So far Abramowitz emails appear to have fallen on deaf ears.

UPDATE 2-25-12: The New Canaan RTC appears eager to erase Roy Abramowitz from his executive role of RTC Treasure. The NCTRC website suddenly doesn’t list Abramowitz as Treasure although he is officially in the job till March 12th and still is the only person with signatory power on their bank account. Funny thing is the web editor they hired to make changes can’t get a paid unless Abramowitz signs off.
8:00pm – Abramowitz, as Treasure, got the web designer to adjust the NCRTC member list page. I learned the request was made to take his name/title off the RTC website on 2-21-12 after the NCRTC Chairman and Secretary knew I was working on this story. According to Abramowitz, this request was made without executive committee approval.

Additionally, it appears in anticipation of this story coming out the RTC has now come up with a date for the Lincoln Dinner – April 13th. House Majority Leader Lawrence Cafero will be the guest speaker. It will be interesting to see how the New Canaan Republicans come up with the dollars in the next month to pay the New Canaan Country Club their expensive catering fees.

Editors Note: I’d like to thank members of the State’s GOP for helping me fact check this story.

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