The heat on the Montgomery County Board of (S)Elections continues from the “Concerned Election Workers of Montgomery County Ohio” in a second mailing.
This letter begins by asking how Director Steve Harsman managed to get the media to try to investigate the whistle blowers instead of responding properly to the allegations. Our “elected officials” promptly tasked the Sheriff to find the whistle blowers so as not to disturb the corrupt little club in the basement of the County Building where they find jobs for convicted rapists who are family members.
The second two allegations- that the Board’s failure with 8 provisional ballots prevented a Kettering business from getting a liquor permit in 2006 followed by allegations that Harsman and Deputy Director Betty Smith have been paying themselves outlandish amounts of overtime (almost $70K between the two of them in 2010) merit further investigation.
That Smith and Harsman’s base salary starts out at double what other board of elections directors make should be the first question, followed by the outlandish overtime.
The document is a real eye-opener: Montgomery County Board of Elections Outed 2 letter PDF [1]Please download, read and distribute.
Although I received this today, typically this group also mails to every other BOE in the state, the secretary of state and media outlets. Harsman was also hot on the case last time to see the address labels, thinking that some of them were actually generated in the Board of Elections and “stolen.”
What is clear is that some honest people who have worked under these two have had enough of the undemocratic ways of our “guardians” of the (s)election process and are going to continue to dig up dirt until a proper investigation by an impartial and honest investigating agency takes place.
Why one hasn’t been invited in yet is a mystery- other than the people in power, want to stay in power instead of in jail.
The concerned election workers would like to thank the county employees that tipped us off about the problems with KT 3-H and Steve and Betty’s salary abuses. While you have provided us with a great deal of information in addition to those two problems much of it involves people other than Steve and Betty and our policy is to only expose the truth and provable facts regarding Steve and Betty. A good example of this would be the photos we received. We WILL NOT use “information” like that ever.
There are plenty of staff members that can take the place of Harsman and Smith and those staff members need to step up to the plate and let board members know they can take over when those two are fired. Until then keep the information flowing and keep doing the outstanding work you do every day that produces fair elections every year in our county. You are probably the least appreciated government workers in the county!
Ironic that the sheriff seemingly dropped any investigation into the board’s ‘errors’. He wouldn’t want any ballots of his “lost” in any future election !! I’m sure looking for the whistleblowers is a dormant case too, if not at the bottom of his priority list.
As for bonuses, WTF ?? Is it typical for gov’t employees to receive bonuses ? In my experience, bonuses are tied to company performance, i.e. profits. How are bonuses here justified ?
Finally, you know they’ll be all over the auditor to find out WHO requested that salary information! No doubt it was rec’d anonymously.
Putting this aggregious pillaging of public coffers into perspective!
State Government Employee Salaries[4]
Office’10 SalaryCurrent Official
Governor
$144,269[5]
John Kasich
Lieutenant Governor
$142,501
MaryTaylor
Secretary of State
$109,554
Jon Husted
Attorney General
$109,554
Mike DeWine
Treasurer
$109,554
Josh Mandel
Did I not see Chairman Gregg Gantt complaining on TV that the BOE cannot have more voting hours because of the cost of staying open during after hours?( $500 a hr for staff was the number used ) How much is that $500 going to Dir. Hairmans and Dep. Dir, Smith? What other Directors in Montgomery Co. get overtime. Guess that $100,000 salery PLUS bonuses is not enough? Why do they need two Directors there for OT? Don’t tell me they are cheeting the county by staying on the clock. Do they get comp time as well? How much of that bonus money is going to political parties? Shame on you Chairman Gantt and the rest of the Board members for approving bonuses and such large saleries. sounds like the Sheriff needs to do another investigation! Or is he getting some of the BONUS money for his re-election? Red Flag! Maybe the AG or the FBI needs to do the investigation. I hear some federal laws are being broken too!
This is the same as the Wall Street thugs getting over on the 99%. This is why I no longer want to be affiliated with the Democratic Party, way too much corruption. I thought Tom Ritchie was for the blue class worker. Seems like Harshamn and Ritchie are part of the 1% with their saleries. Good job Mark Owens to allow this corruption to continue. I say we Occupy Dem HQ and elect new leaders that support the 99% I will not vote for any Dem candidates untill this mess is cleaned up and I encourage all D’s to do the same!
[note- rules of this site say use the same name for the same person, I’ve changed to the first name you’ve used]
The is no doubt the two biggest problems in the office are Steve and Beverly. I however feel Betty Smith is just as bad.
She told us from day one how our office would be more professional and how there would be higher standards for staff. At the same time she immediately fully supported an employee in a key position that has a criminal record, had no college experience, has questionable lawsuits in her past and has a problem with “partying”. Everyone in this office knows if this same employee was a man Betty would have got him demoted or fired but does not do so because she is part of her girls club.
Betty claims part of her job is to keep us safe but she didn’t put her foot down and demand Beverly be fired when she and Steve hired Beverly’s dangerous sex offender rapist brother to be one of our coworkers. Did Beverly lose any pay this year Steve and Betty? And you wonder why we leak information. Betty is not a Republican she is a thief.
I think the elections workers should share what has been going on at Chairman Greg Gantt’s BOE with the voters of Oakwood unless Steve and Betty are fired. Maybe they would like to know how he employed a rapist, a drug dealer and has a pervert that was fired for sexual harrassment working as the party photographer and is his golf outing buddy.
Let’s give the powers that be a little time to clean up their mess. We could indeed go door to door in Oakwood and hand out a flyer or send out a mailing about what has gone on at the Board of Elections under the current chairman but that is over the top and something I would expect the occupy Wall Street crowd to do. On the other hand since tax dollars were wasted on using the Sheriff’s Department to investigate a 100% legal anonymous mailing to harass the staff and cover up a balloting mistake maybe that option should be on the table.
Dave is on to something here, the BOE is the most corrupt office in the county. The republician and democratic chairmans hand pick ALL employees. GOP Chairman Gantt is in charge of the Board and Dem Chairman Owens has a brother who works there. (geez) Oh and did I mention Ganatt’s best friend from childhood has a sister that works there, nepotisn at its best!. All saleries and BONUSES are approved by the chairmans, so its their own little county playground to get friends and family members jobs and BONUSES at the tax payers expense. So if you want to question what the hell is going on down there, start with Gantt and Owens!
[Warning- second use of a different name and email – don’t do this. rules of this site say use the same name for the same person, I’ve changed to the first name you’ve used]
I am writing this on behalf of several democrat friends of mine that work at the Board of Elections who wrote this statement.
We have absolutely had it with Steve, Betty, and Beverly and are very angry that all three were not fired years ago. We cannot take working in a toxic work environment anymore!!! Steve and Betty steal more money in overtime than they pay some of of our longtime staff in a whole year!!! What was labor union leader Tom Ritchie doing all these years letting our overpaid managers steal overtime money and letting them abuse us and tell us in front of other staff that we can go work at McDonald’s and Taco Bell??? Steve should be in prison for the voting machines he and others stole from Diebold in 2005.
The workers in election operations violate safe lifting rules in our opinion and OSHA should be called in. Why did labor union leader Tom Ritchie never make sure our work environment was safe during election time??? Let’s all expose the truth about Stealing P. Hairsham!!!
I am so ashamed to have ever worked at the BOE. It was a decent place to work before theives like Steve and Betty started working there. Jim Nathanson should be shamed out of town for supporting Betty for that job, she was terrible at the courts. Steve and Betty should have to pay back the money the stole from the county. Didn’t Betty have a secretary that hated blacks and jews that had a husband that had a swastika tattoo that he showed off at Jim Nathanson’s house? What is going on in our County??
LOL Stealing P. Hairsham, how on the money is that nickname? Lot’s of information here and from emails but a lot of it is stuff that is not new and just doesn’t have enough to get the media interested. Still have plenty for several media releases though, thanks.
What about the poll workers who are the life blood of the elections. They haven’t received a raise in years, they work all day for pennies on the dollar while Stealing Hairsman and Bonus $mith are getting thousands in OT and bonuses. So is Chairman Gantt talking the republician stance saying the BOE can’t afford to have extra voting hrs to help the poor and elderly who have trouble doing the absentee ballots, where is the Tea Party when you need them? He sure dosen’t have a problem aproving the OT and bonuses! So who is in charge of this place? Why aren’t the elected officials up in arms questioning these salaries? What does the county adminastrator think? Or is she asleep at the wheel again like when Tremell was stealing from the county?
What other county employees are receiving bonuses at the tax payers expense? Lets open the books for the last 10 years and take a look see! My bet its only the loyal party members who are receiving the majority of these bonuses, why do county employees receive bonuses anyway? Do they inflate their budgets so the party fateful can receive Christmas money or just to donate tp political functions? Sounds like a independent non political agency needs to do a investigation. A agency who has a head that is not elected, the sheriff’s office couldn’t to a impartial investigation. Probably would have the same problen with the AG or SOS officies, they are all so tied into each other, we will probably never found how bad we are all getting screwed! And people wonder why we don’t trust our goverment. Fight the power people, when you go to the polls vote out the incumbents. We need Esrati to run NOW for office more than ever!
Ultimately Stealin’ and Bonus represent everything that is wrong in the county right now. The coroner’s office has more than 60 staff, which includes medical doctors and has only one director. The director there has 40 years of experience and is paid less in a year than Stealin’ and Bonus make when they add in their overtime and bonus money. There is a medical doctor working for the coroner that was paid less than Stealin’ and Bonus! There is now a ton of information that can be used for future media releases. Maybe Esrati should do a story about this abuse of tax dollars? The DDN is as expected dropping the ball. Has Esrati shared what is going on at the BOE with his “occupy” friends?
I am usually not a big fan of name calling because it shows a lack of maturity. I have to say calling Steve and Betty Steal and Bonus in this case is both funny and deserved.
I like the idea of getting the Board office cleaned up first and then going after Gantt. Both Smith and Gantt must go if the party is ever going to recover. We simply can’t afford to have them screw up in 2012 like they did in 2010.
Are the guys behind this mailing looking to start cleaning up Republican party as well? It looks like they have the right stuff to take the leadership out. If they are going to do it, sooner is better than later. Are there any Democrats looking to clean up their party as well?
Here is the bottom line. I of course have all the information and ability needed to dismantle the Gantt administration. There are plenty Republican Party members that would love to see that happen for selfish reasons but my only interest is the party winning elections and deserving respect again because it truly looks out for the best interests of responsible taxpayers. Anyone could have run the party in 2010 and come up with the same results.
If Gantt has any hope of being able to function as the party chair in 2012 he will have to come to the table soon and present a serious plan. Likewise if those that have an interest in seeing Gantt go (Tea Party for example) have a solid plan we would be happy to discuss it with them as well. Now is the time to act.
Let me understand this correctly, if the proseutor’s office can’t find any wrong doing by the whistle blowers who is guilty of the inaccurate tabulation? Is it Hairsham? $mith? Board Members? Seems like the Director and his hungry Deputy were doing some creative math. Come on people, these two are not the kind of honest employee’s you want running your election. I heard with my own ears that the poll workers were not handing out the second page of the ballot. Harshamn and Smith fugdged the numbers to correct their mistake. Cover it up anyway you choose but numbers don’t add up. This is just the appetizer, lets get into the meat and potatoes of the real sham that is going on. Waste busters has enough material here to do a hr long 60 minute style show here. Expose the Board of Elections and talk to the former and current employee’s that can reveal the criminal activity that goes on almost every election. Plenty of people standing in line to tell the TRUTH! WTF Get Er Done!
Its always nice being exhonerated. Let’s see if the sheriff’s department is as diligent in investigating the board as they were in investigating the source of the document. http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/election/charges-not-filed-in-voting-dispute-1274620.html
Now that we know the document is real how many voters never got a full ballot? Seems like a lot were in the the City of Dayton in African American neighborhoods. Does the NAACP and SCLC know what is going on here?