Ohio Attorney General: Abraham Must Resign?
Ohio Attorney General, Marc Dann, responded, in an opinion dated March 19, 2008, to a request from Licking County Prosecuting Attorney, Ken Oswalt. Oswalt had asked for a follow-up opinion concerning Granville Township Trustee, Fred Abraham, and the lease of his property to the Township as a highway garage.
In an attempt to avoid a conflict, Abraham, upon taking office, leased the property to Guy Manos who, in turn, leased it to the Township. The Attorney General states that Abraham "...is prohibited by R.C.511.13 from serving as township trustee and continuing to have an interest in that preexisting multi-year contract."
Abraham must either resign his position as Township Trustee or have the contract with the Township cancelled. Keeping the contract until the Township is able to build another garage does not seem to be an option.
The Attorney General stated that "This conclusion is required because a contrary finding would permit a township trustee to do indirectly that which he cannot lawfully do directly."
Attorney General
Marc Dann
He went on to write, "The arrangement is thus structured to allow the use of a middleman to distance the trustee from the township's contract while permitting the trustee to benefit from the arrangement. To find that the use of a middleman removes all prohibited interests in contracts would conflict with the manner in which R.C.511.13 has been interpreted and applied."
"In addition, such a finding might well encourage the creation of various devious mechanisms intended to allow a township trustee, officer, or employee to benefit indirectly from township contracts in contravention of the prohibition imposed by R.C.511.13. Accordingly, we must reject this construction of R.C.511.13."
Click here to read the complete text of the Attorney General's Opinion.
The Granville Press asked Kitty Consolo, a candidate for Township Trustee defeated by Fred Abraham, for her view of the situation: "In July, before Fred even filed a petition for Trustee, I asked him to get an opinion. I told him I thought it was going to be a problem."
When asked what should be done, Consolo replied, "Fred should resign and the Trustees should appoint someone else."
"I'm not interested in being appointed in Fred's place. There are many qualified, interested candidates for the job, such as Dan Van Ness and Tim Hughes." Consolo stated.
Consolo went on to say, "The township needs a new garage, but it should be done in conjunction with the Village and not rushed to fix Fred's problem."
Click here for a related previous story published 01/29/08: New Documents Regarding Township - Abrahams Garage Lease.
Click here for a related previous story published 01/24/08: Township Leases Garage from Abraham’s Former Campaign Treasurer: See The Documents.
Click here for a related previous story published 01/18/08: Trustee Abraham In Prohibited Conflict Of Interest.
Fred..
Kitty shows her usual lack of good judgment in her comments.
Guess who has more potential conflicts than ol' Fred?
Dan Van Ness farms hundreds of acres for other people in the Township. As a member of the Township Zoning Commission,
he has failed to recuse himself on several rezoning decisions
that would have changed properties that he farms away from an
AG classification.
Tim Hughes is a realtor. Enough said.
Kitty is a 4 time loser.
Keep Fred!
T-shirts
http://www.cafepress.com/savefred
Any proceeds will be donated to Vilage for purchase of new garage lease.
Let's not get all excited
From what I have read it looks like Fred tried to distance him from the lease of the garage.
I have known Fred for some time now and he is an honest and decent guy. I know that if he cuts off the lease with the township for the garage space that the new headline would read "Fred Abraham Throws the Township Out!" or some other over exuberant statement.
To me, it looks like Fred tried to work out a win-win situation for the township. Fred was elected by 60% of the vote. It looks like some "old Granville" types are scared because Fred does wield some new ideas and with 60% of the people supporting him they have to listen. On top of that the "establishment" is probably not happy because he does not live in the village but comes from the other side of the freeway.
Give Fred some time to consider what the Attorney General" has to say and about how to resolve the situation that will not involve throwing the township out of their garage and into the streets.
For the better of the township I am sure that if it comes down to throwing the township out of the garage or resigning Fred will probably resign to not press the hardship on the township of having to construct a new garage with no funds to do it. Or maybe they could construct the new garage on the front lawn of Bryn Du since we can't use it for sports anymore?????
"Save Fred" T shirts, I will buy one!
RRH
A Rather Misleading Headline (though, not unexpected)
Probably to the dismay of many on this blog, Fred Abraham will remain as trustee for years to come - which is a benefit to our community, and certainly strengthens the governing body of the township.
Certainly, Mr. Abraham has other options available to him to divest himself from the conflict of interest opinion (R.C. 511.13) from the Ohio AG. Resignation is the LAST option he should consider. He just needs to end the lease with Granville Township, or sell the building (and I'm sure there are several other options available). I suspect Mr. Abraham will continue to act in accordance to the law as he has since he was elected by two-thirds of the township voters.
In reading through the request by the Licking County Prosecutor, it appears to me that the current situation of establishing a third party arrangement appeased Ken Oswalt (the county prosecutor), who then forwarded the new status of the case to the Ohio Atty General to make sure it passed the letter of the law.
Marc Dann has given his opinion and now Mr. Abraham must divest himself of the lease arrangement. He does not have to resign as your headline indicates. He simply can't be involved in the transaction, which is troubling for the township as now they are going to be without a storage facility for equipment, machinery and office space. I'm sure it will get worked out, and life will get back to normal in sleepy little Granville.
Pardon me . Normal ? Sleepy
Pardon me .
Normal ?
Sleepy ?
Not exactly the words i would describe gville .
This is ridiculous. Why is
This is ridiculous.
Why is Kitty Consolo even getting press on this? So we can all laugh at her sour grapes?
Fred SHOULD NOT resign.
SAVE FRED.
You know, I think I'm going to make t-shirts.
Nacho Man . You couldnt be
Nacho Man .
You couldnt be as right as right could be .
Save Fred !
Fred
Jimmy,
I think you are right about this. Fred got sucked into it.
A shame that he has to pay when the others should.
ot
The Sky Is Falling!
Doesn't anybody care that the sky is falling and nice guys are doing nothing?
Too bad.
This shouldn't have gone this far. Isn't there anyone monitoring the elections to make sure that conflicts like these don't happen? the law Director? I know the subject came up last summer but were the consequences clear to the community or FRED? He's a great guy and I'd vote for him again. Too bad he's losing his job.
I feel sorry for Fred
I really feel sorry for Fred Abraham.
I think he probably got sucked into this mess by Jim Havens and Wes Sargent and he doesn't know what he's doing.
If he is really the good guy I think he is, he'll resign and let the "good old boys" appoint one of their own.
Wes needs someone to defend him in his fence-fight and Habig just wants to retain power.
They'll probably appoint Ron Sheldon and keep the beat going...
What a surprise -- the question is why has it taken this long?
This has been an obvious conflict of interest from the beginning.
Why did the trustees not follow state law on conflicts of interest? Why did the trustees not follow the first attorney general opinion related to this conflict of interest? Why did the trustees use what the attorney general calls a "devious mechanism" to try to get around state law on conflicts of interest?
A lot of questions still need to be answered on this one.