Friday, April 28, 2000
Taft's free tickets criticized
Democratic leader: Dem. leader claims Ohio State passes may violate ethics law
By
The Associated Press
COLUMBUS — The chairman of the Ohio Democratic Party says Republican Gov. Bob Taft's acceptance of $2,688 worth of Ohio State football tickets might have violated state ethics laws regulating gifts.
David Leland compared the situation with the case of Cleveland City Council members receiving free season tickets to Indians games. The Ohio Ethics Commission ruled in 1995 that the practice was illegal.
“I don't see any difference,” Mr. Leland told the Columbus Dispatch for a story Wednesday. “This just adds more concern to the governor getting these tickets for free and then scalping them for $50,000 a pop. It seems to me the rationale used in the 1995 ethics opinion would apply to Gov. Taft.”
The governor received eight free tickets, valued at $48 each, to seven games at Ohio Stadium in 1999.
Some of them were passed on to Republicans who contributed $50,000 to Team Ohio, the party's operating account to which donations need not be disclosed.
David Freel, ethics commission executive director, declined to comment directly on Taft's receiving the free tickets, a gift given to governors by Ohio State University for decades.
“We generally advise public officials always to pay for their own tickets,” he said.
But Taft spokesman Scott Milburn said Mr. Freel gave no such advice to the governor.
“What's unfortunate is that if the executive director of the ethics commission thought there was any problem with this 30-year-old tradition, then he should have raised it with prior governors and with this governor,” he said. “This is a well-established and well-known tradition. It's been fully reported and documented.”
Gov. Taft disclosed the tickets as gifts on his ethics statement for 1999.
Merome Brachman, chairman of the commission and a member since 1974, said the Cleveland case differed in that it dealt with a private entity potentially seeking favor from public officials.
“I believe the commission then, and probably now, views public institutions in a different context,” Mr. Brachman said Wednesday, contending that public institutions should have “the opportunity to work with high public officials to further the purposes of the institution.”
Mr. Taft and three former governors — Republicans George Voinovich and James Rhodes, and Democrat Richard Celeste — all have booths in the Ohio Stadium press box, replete with eight free tickets per home game.
Mr. Milburn said that if the commission determines that Mr. Taft should pay for his football tickets, “the governor would be happy to do that.”
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