HOUSE RULES STANDING COMMITTEE January 30, 1997 6:07 p.m. MEMBERS PRESENT Representative Pete Kott, Chairman Representative Irene Nicholia Representative Al Vezey Representative Gail Phillips Representative Brian Porter Representative Bill Williams Representative Kim Elton MEMBERS PRESENT All members present OTHER HOUSE MEMBERS PRESENT Representative Jerry Sanders Representative Joe Green Representative John Cowdery COMMITTEE CALENDAR Continuation of January 29, 1997, meeting: Select Committee on Legislative Ethics Decision H96-02 WITNESS REGISTER MARGIE MACNEILLE, Chair House Subcommittee Select Committee on Legislative Ethics P.O. Box 101468 Anchorage, Alaska 99510-1468 Telephone: (907) 258-8172 SUSIE BARNETT, Professional Assistant Select Committee on Legislative Ethics P.O. Box 101468 Anchorage, Alaska 99510-1468 Telephone: (907) 258-8172 ACTION NARRATIVE TAPE 97-3, SIDE A Number 001 CHAIRMAN PETE KOTT called the House Rules Committee meeting back to order at 6:07 p.m. All members were present. CHAIRMAN KOTT: This evening, we will continue the hearings on the Ethics Case H96-02, also known as Re Sanders. We have invited two members from the Ethics Committee to be with us this evening, Margie MacNeille and Susie Barnett. We really appreciate you taking the time from your schedule. I'm sure you probably had other things that you could have done this evening, and we certainly appreciate you coming to Juneau and offering us some information regarding this particular matter. What I would like to do is, as I have done with previous individuals who have testified, is to ask you to raise your right hand, and we'll do it jointly. Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about the information you're about to give to this committee, so help you God? MARGIE MACNEILLE, CHAIR, HOUSE SUBCOMMITTEE, SELECT COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATIVE ETHICS: I do. SUSIE BARNETT, PROFESSIONAL ASSISTANT, SELECT COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATIVE ETHICS: I do. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Thank you. And for the record, would you initially state your name and affiliation. Number 120 MS. MACNEILLE: My name is Margie MacNeille. I am here as the chair of the House Subcommittee of the Select Committee on Legislative Ethics. With me is Susie Barnett, who is our sole, loyal and wonderful staffer. And I'd just like to introduce to the committee, also here is Shirley McCoy, who is a public member of the committee as well. I think a lot of you know her. She lives in Juneau, so she didn't have to make the trek to come down here. Number 177 CHAIRMAN KOTT: I know this is a thankless job that you're in, so on behalf of the committee, and I guess the entire legislature, we want to say thanks for your efforts in this matter and every other matter you've been involved with. What I would like to offer is the opportunity for you to make some opening remarks, and I think, with the indulgence of the committee, we will just open it up for questions from the committee and get right to the issues. Number 222 MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. If -- I would thank you for the opportunity to make some opening remarks, and I hope -- I hope we can get through them promptly enough for you all to still be awake. I want to thank the committee sincerely for the opportunity to come and talk to you. Thank you for choosing to, as the -- the House -- choosing to refer this to Rules and have a hearing on it, because this is the first time that an Ethics Committee recommendation for sanctions has come to the House, only the second time that this Ethics Committee has made any recommendations. And I think it is very appropriate for the House, through a committee, to assure itself that this has worked the way it wanted it to go. Under the Alaska Constitution, Article II, Section 12, each house is the judge of its own members' qualifications. To me, that means that you members of the House are the final authority in this matter. And you are the people responsible for making the decision, and you need to know what -- what information you require in order to make that decision. In 1992, as -- as I remember it, among a period of concern about legislative ethics, the existing model of an ethics committee which was dominated by legislators was changed to one where the initial steps of an ethics investigation were given to an ethics committee with mostly public members, because the -- that committee was meant to be a nonpolitical body. That committee was meant to make an independent decision which would not be considered tarred, in any way, by a partisan political brush. It -- the thinking, as I remember, was to give credibility to the process, give the legislature some way to deal with the situation without it looking as though it were just a question of power politics. Now that process comes to you, and I think it's important for you to understand that process and to assure yourself that the Ethics Committee is, in fact, the nonpolitical, independent, nonpartisan body that it was designed to be. First, I want to deal with the question of political bias of the committee. And here, I have to deal with personal issues first. And there are things that will -- there are -- I will get angry tonight, and I apologize for that, and I want to say to begin with that I'm not angry at you. And the first concern of mine is the allegations about a conflict of interest of mine because of my husband and the work he has done for the state. I am proud of what my husband has done for this state. In 1989, I was appointed to this Ethics Committee. In 1990, my husband, Julian Mason, began work on the state royalty and tax settlements under the Cooper Administration. He brought in $290 million in settlements. In '92 and '93, there were settlements with BP and Exxon, and their tax settlements imposed between two and three billion dollars. Now, my husband didn't do this all by himself, no doubt, but I feel that he was instrumental. That was under the Hickel Administration and the attorney general at that point was Charlie Cole. In 1994, my husband began work on the mental health settlement which was finally settled in a special session of this legislature and then tried in the -- in the winter of that year. Then, later on, under the Knowles Administration, he's undertaken some role in the subsistence issues. When and how money came to his firm on behalf of the service he has done for this state, I don't know. It's not my business what their billing situation is. All I can tell you is, if you care when or how that money came, you need to look at when the work was done. My husband assures me, and it's my recollection, that the bulk of work he did was under the Hickel Administration. And how does this relate to me? What does this have to do with my role on this committee? First, you should know this is old news. I raised this issue with the legislature repeatedly. At my confirmation hearings in 1993, the first time this committee was constituted in its current form, I discussed it at my confirmation hearings on January 12th, I filed a letter asking for an advisory committee -- advisory opinion from this committee about whether there was a difficulty, my being on the committee with my husband having -- doing the work he was doing. In 1995, I asked again for an advisory opinion on the same issue. And both times, those -- the Ethics Committee, without me participating and without me being in the room, decided that there was no problem. Secondly, I've been on this committee since 1989, an ethics committee in one form or another. I've been confirmed by this legislature four times. I've worked with lots of legislators on lots of cases. If I were in some form a lackey of an administration, I think you might have noticed it by now. I was not beholden to the Cooper Administration. I was not beholden to the Hickel Administration. I am not beholden to the Knowles Administration. And it's difficult for me not to resent that implication. I am not a robot here carrying out some governor's orders. I want to also address the question of whether I had personal revenge motives against Representative Sanders because he voted against me in a confirmation hearing. I didn't even know that he had done that until well into this particular proceeding this fall. As best I can find out, I didn't know it until a -- a letter that his attorney wrote to the master, Michael White, on the 16th of October. But it doesn't matter 'cause I didn't care. I don't care why people would vote for me or against me. There are all kinds of reasons, many of which may be trivial, some of which may be significant. It is not a problem for me. I was not after Representative Sanders because of that. Finally, this is a committee. It is ludicrous to me to suggest that I could persuade six committee members to violate their legal obligations for some nefarious purpose of mine. The members on this committee come from all over this state. And if you know Cynthia Toohey, or Joe Donohue, or Shirley McCoy, or Ed Granger, or Edith Vorderstrasse, you know how strong-willed these people are. You know that they're not sheep that I led astray, and they'll be glad to tell you so. You confirmed them. You chose people who are not politically active in a partisan way. They're active in their communities but not on a partisan basis. Once we're on the committee, we're politically neutered. We can't post yard signs. We can't go to fund raisers. We can't give money. We can't do anything. And we don't. The people on this committee work hard for no pay at considerable personal sacrifice. They don't do that for some political reason that they've hidden. I want to try to get off my high horse here for a minute and -- and go through the process we went through so you understand why we did some of the things we did, not out of political motivation, and so you can assess some of the issues that Representative Sanders raised yesterday. And to do that I wanted some charts and time lines. I hope they'll be of some help. MS. BARNETT: Would you like these handed out? MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. We're recycle. This chart is the same chart that some of you may have seen at the [indisc.--simultaneous- speech]. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: I can't see it the way it is. MS. MACNEILLE: We had a lot of trouble figuring out where to put it, so that anybody could ... MS. BARTLETT: Here, you don't have to read. Number 750 CHAIRMAN KOTT: For the record, we will label this particular handout Exhibit E. It's the case review H96-02. MS. MACNEILLE: What I want to do with both this chart, which is the generic chart of how the complaint process, and the time line, kind of walk through what we did. And I think one of the concerns is that we, the committee, in some way changed the timing of the process for some political purpose. And I hope when this is through, you'll see why we did what we did and -- and with what timing. The statute -- the Ethics Committee statute sets out a series of steps that we have to go through, and we also have procedures adopted which define some of those and set some time lines as well. The first thing that happens when a complaint comes in to the little mailbox up there is that it's checked to see if it meets the surface requirements for a complaint. Is it notarized, that kind of thing. And then -- and that's done at staff level. The committee doesn't see it -- the subcommittee committee, let's say, doesn't see the complaint at that point. The next step is that it comes to the committee to say if true, if we just assumed the facts here were true, would there be a violation. And then you adopt -- the committee -- if it's yes, it adopts a resolution for scope of investigation. Now, if you'll look at this, on this complaint, we received it April 19, 1996. So -- and it appeared to be okay on its face. It met the -- the initial statutory requirements. The question was when were we going to schedule a committee meeting to go to the step of, if true, is it a violation. Well, we're looking at the last three weeks of session. In my experience, that's never been a good time to try and schedule a committee meeting with legislators in it. In scheduling this committee, it's not easy. We have people from all over the state. But most important, we have legislators, and you all have a different life schedule than the rest of us. You have a very intense period of work, when you're really busy with other things, understandably, to you more important than -- than our committee meetings. And then you have the summer off to make a living or, you know, to take a deep breath, and you're not all that interested in coming to an Ethics Committee meeting. So it's always tough. In this case, it was even harder because then you had the special session. So we worked it so we thought we could have a meeting June 7th, the day after the last day of session, and our legislative members would be available. In fact, due to Representative Toohey's situation on June 7th and this -- this special session, we couldn't have the meeting. It was cancelled. We were unable to reschedule that meeting until July 24th. And that is not a question of deliberate timing on our part. That was the question, it's the first time we could get us -- we could schedule all of us at a meeting, or think we could. Let me make clear that during this proceeding, Representative Toohey was the person, the legislator who made the quorum. Representative Mackie participated in one meeting but not in the others, and he's -- he was busy on the campaign trail and other things, and to come to us from Craig is -- to Anchorage from Craig is a -- a problem, a logistics problem. So, July 24th we went to the second step, which was adopt a scope of resolution, if that's what we were going to do. We met and we did. The next phase is investigation. In this instance, we asked our law firm, Bogle and Gates, Mike Spaan, I don't know if many of you are familiar with him, but he was the U.S. Attorney under Republican Administration, to -- to supervise the investigation. And this chart here shows, in very summary form, some of the things that went on to try and get that investigation going. Because by statute this phase is confidential, we have not given you any kind of detail here, although some of these documents, I think, might have come -- or discussions of this might have come from Representative Sanders. There is a more detailed version available, but we certainly couldn't do that without Representative Sanders waiving the confidentiality. The next thing that happens is, after investigation, we have to look at the results of the investigation to see what the story is. And then we call that the probable cause. We can either say, yes, there's probably cause; no, there isn't. And that meeting was set on September 9th, for September 23rd, which was another time we were able to get everyone together. At that point, we had some indication that Representative Sanders was eager to tell his side of the story, which he had not so far. His attorney attended the meeting but did not make a presentation. At the meeting we addressed the question of whether there was probable cause, and at that -- once you -- if you determine there is, then the committee has to make a choice, by statute, between corrective action or issuing formal charges. In this case, the committee determined that some -- that formal charges were appropriate. And those formal charges were issued September 24th. They were sent and received September 26th. Then you get to October, where the fun begins. So, to -- to recap here, the committee has seen the complaint once when it decided whether or not to investigate and once again on the probable cause determinations. The way our committee operates is that the material is there for securing and then we give it back to Susie. It's not something we take home and dwell over. The -- once -- once we've issued the formal charges, we issue the summons, the complaint. Our procedures required us to hold a hearing within a 20- to 60-day window: not sooner than 20 days, not later than 60 days after formal charges were issued. On October 1st, Susie sent out a request to all of us for our calendar information for the months of October and November and December to indicate our availability. And those came back promptly. And at that point, somewhere in the second week of October, it became clear to me that we had to have this hearing before November 19th, and here's why. Ed Granger, a Republican member of our committee, was going first to Boston and then to South Africa on the 19th of November; he's still there now. If we were to have this hearing with Mr. Granger present, we had to have it before the 19th. Otherwise, we'd be into this year, and the existing members on the -- of the committee would be gone. Cynthia Toohey and Jerry Mackie would no longer be on the committee, since she was not running, and now Senator Mackie was hoping to move up in the world, if that's what it is, I .... And so, we were stuck. We had -- we had to have it completed by November 19th, before Ed left. I think that if we'd chosen to have this hearing without Ed there, you'd all be looking at this in the -- you would be just as angry with us. I don't know. So that's the story of how we came up with the hearing date. The time that members were available that we could have the hearing. The decision was made, as you can see on this time chart, October 10th. We sent a letter to Representative Sanders' attorney, Mr. Syren, and to Mike Spaan in his capacity as representing the -- sort of the investigative or prosecutor side of the committee, on November 14th and 15th. That decision was not made when Judge Murphy issued some kind of stay. That decision was made October 10th. That week, Representative Sanders, who had not answered the formal charges, sent through his attorney a letter to the subcommittee objecting to the summons for the charges and raising a variety of procedural concerns. And also that week, and it doesn't show on here, we didn't put everything on here, we started getting discovery requests. I got one on the 8th and one on the 9th, voluminous discovery requests. And people started asking for us to release public documents. Let me talk -- this is -- goes to the question of who is Michael White and what's the story about the hearing officer. The only -- the hearing we had before, in the Jacko matter, we had used a hearing officer to run the hearing so that the chair, in that case, Joe Donohue, could have a hearing and not -- listen to the evidence and not have to rule on procedural motions and things like that. And that was our intent also in this case, if there was going to be a hearing. That week we didn't have an indication from Representative Sanders whether or not a hearing was going to be required. But we were piling up these -- these motions and challenges to various things the committee had done. We had two choices: I could rule on them myself or I could get someone else, a lawyer who is a litigator, a person who had been a judge, to deal with this. Now, you know, it's no secret to me that Representative Sanders, you know, gets upset when he sees my signature. I was not going to be the person to rule on these things, especially because some of them were about interrogatories addressed to me. So I decided we would use the procedure we have for selecting a hearing officer. We pulled the list of 11 potential masters and officers -- hearing officers that we had used in the Jacko matter and sent them out to -- to Representative Sanders' attorney and to Mike Spaan. The normal procedure is, when a master is appointed or [indisc.] thing, that a list goes out, people strike off the people they don't like or, you know, give reasons why certain people should be recused, and say, well, here are some people you should use. And that's a reasonably prompt process. What we heard in response from Representative Sanders' attorney is that he wanted to wait two weeks while he interviewed the candidates. That kind of delay, given our necessity to have the hearing on November 14th, was not going to work. Mr. Spaan recommended that we use either David Stewart or Peter Partnow as masters. Both people -- Mr. Stewart served us beautifully in the Jacko matter, and I would have loved to have used him. He was unavailable on vacation. Came home, opened the mail, there was a fund raising letter, a political fund raising letter, and on the bottom, among the list of names were David Stewart and Peter Partnow. I thought, Oh, great, these are the last people I'm going to choose because there's going to be some allegation that they have some political axe to grind. So I took them off the list and went with Mr. White. Mr. White was a prosecutor for a long time. He was a district court judge at, I believe at the same time as Mr. Stewart, and a person who I knew to be a competent litigator and someone who could handle the hearing. So I picked him. As far as I know, the last personal contact I'd had with Mr. White before that time was in 1988. He and I served on a bar committee together. It was not some effort to pick someone with a political axe to grind. Then from there we moved -- we moved towards the hearing. Fortunately, Mr. White took over a continual barrage of procedural motions from Mr. -- from Representative Sanders' attorney, from Mr. Syren. That -- that's -- that was what we hired him to do. Mr. Spaan, Mr. Syren and Mr. White, have at it. That was fine as far as we were concerned. Orders came out. Not a problem. We had, on October 22nd, a committee teleconference about procedural matters. I believe at the same time, I'm not sure exactly when it was, I guess it was October 21st Representative Sanders filed, in superior court, a request for stay of proceedings. And Judge Murphy was assigned. Judge Murphy is a district court judge sitting as a superior court judge because they were short of judges at that time. This court case raised an issue that I think is of really central importance to the legislature, and that's the question of whether the superior court has any business telling the legislature what to do on disciplining its members. To me, the Alaska Supreme Court has said in earlier cases, that it is the legislature's job, under the constitution, to deal with its own internal matters. And I think that's an important distinction to be made. And so the committee responded to Representative Sanders' efforts to get the superior court to intervene in this proceeding. There has been some discussion from Representative Sanders that we, in some political way, went to change the judge from one person to another. Now I want to talk about how that happened in case there's anything I can do to clear that up. When I heard that Judge Murphy had been assigned to the case I knew that Judge Murphy is a district court judge. The kind of case this is, which is -- can -- might be characterized as an appeal -- oh, it'd certainly have to do with requesting an injunction, is the kind of case that belongs in superior court, and without any disrespect to Judge Murphy, I wanted a judge who had had experience in those particular kinds of issues. When you file a notice for change of judge you have no idea who you're going to end up with. You can end up with any judge that's -- you know, whoever comes up next. I don't even know what the process is the superior court goes through, but you have no control, and who we would have gotten next, we would, from our point of view, we were stuck with. We had no idea that Judge Eric Sanders was going to end up with the case. For all I knew, he and Representative Sanders were cousins. But the -- at that point, once he was assigned to the case, if Representative Sanders had felt that Judge Sanders was not able to give him a fair hearing, he could have filed a change of judge and we would have ended up with whoever else we would've [sic] ended up with, and the committee would have had no further opportunity to change it. So I don't think it's appropriate for this committee to think there's some political motive that we were angling for some kind of Democratic judge to help out here. That is not what happened, and then we had no control over who we ended up with. You know, I was looking for someone who had experience in these things, but I didn't think I was going to get the freshest judge on the bench, either. There's -- in the event Judge Sanders agreed that the superior court did not have any business telling the legislature how to address qualifications or -- or discipline of its members, and meanwhile the hearing preparation went on. And we had the hearing November 14th and 15th. All the public members and Representative Toohey were present. Representative Mackie was unable to attend, and, you know, then we rendered a decision. Before I get to that, I want to address the concern that the committee is both the accuser and the judge. First, you need to look at what the actual level of committee member involvement in the case is. As I said, we've looked at this three times. We've seen the complaint three times. We've looked at it at the time of making the resolution to investigate, and we looked at it at the time of probable cause, and we looked at it at the hearing. We didn't take the documents home. We weren't involved in the investigation. We weren't involved in the prehearing preparation. We weren't in control of what witnesses were going to be called or the presentation of the case. That -- I don't mean to blame it all on Susie, but that was Mike Spaan's job and Susie's job, and we carefully observed the line there. I didn't know what she was doing as far as the investigations were going, and I didn't want to know. I wanted to see what was going to happen at the hearing. I think committee members -- we all have kids, you know the first story you hear isn't necessarily the whole story. And I think we can keep an open mind about -- you know, here's what we have now, but what turns out to be the evidence in front of us is something entirely different. There's no pressure on us, or among us, to say that once we've brought a charge we have to carry it out or else we'll look dumb. If we were worried about how we looked we wouldn't be doing this. There's no -- there's -- in the Jacko case, as I recall, we brought a number of claims. And in the end, I think maybe only two of those proved out. And we didn't feel like that had been a failure. We felt like we'd done what we needed to do. The model of using a commission or committee to do both the charges -- the investigation, the charges and then the hearing, is one that's used elsewhere. And there are two examples that I could find by running through my book real quickly without doing legal research on this is, as I understand, the APOC committee -- the APOC, the first stages of investigation are done by the staff, but the commission itself does the probable cause determination and then it does the hearing. The Judicial Conduct Commission does all the stages. They do investigation, they do probable cause and then they do the hearing. The alternative to that, and I'm -- I'm not opposed to it, but I think an alternative to that is something a lot more expensive than what we have now. This Ethics Committee is a shoestring operation. We have a part-time staff. We keep telling her she's part-time, although she doesn't get to work part-time; she has to work all the time, and then volunteer members, and we don't get paid. We -- you know, we run on practically nothing. If you want to have independent staff do investigation, or if you want to go to an executive-director-with-staff model that makes a recommendation to a committee that meets once in awhile, it's going to be a lot more expensive. You have the weigh the benefit of that with what we're talking about here. If you look at the history of violations or corrective action or things like that in this Ethics Committee, this legislature is clean. I grew up in Maryland. I mean, you know, there's a history of minor violations, and if you want to put a lot of money into a more elaborate procedure, fine, but you have to decide whether that's going to do a lot for the - or do enough additional, for public and legislative faith in the process. Now, I'm close to getting to the merits. The first thing I want to say is, listening to Representative Sanders yesterday, I thought it was very unfortunate that he never made these arguments or explained himself to us. The first time we heard this was on Gavel to Gavel yesterday. How much better off we all would have been if he could have admitted to us that he wrote the letter, and explained why, instead of us having to go through -- Susie and Mike Spaan went through all these hoops and things to try and demonstrate to us that the letter came. And if, instead of going through this taking the Fifth Amendment, going through this evidentiary 'round-the-corner stuff, the lawyers could have debated the distinction between non-governmental and legislative. We could have had a hearing on the law or the questions of policy instead of whether the Fifth Amendment applied. But here we are. Our committee did the best it could with the evidence we had in front of us. I'm afraid that what we've brought to you is a circus. We had a lot of wild allegations about the committee. We've had a committee defending its every decision, [indisc.] here. We have public attention on this way out of proportion to what happened. And I'm sorry, but it wasn't because we wanted it that way. We have to look at Representative Sanders' role in creating that. I don't think it's fair to suggest that if this committee or the legislature finds a violation for Representative Sanders here that you're all condemned, to raise some sort of specter of mass condemnation of innocent letters you all have written. The committee is on record in favor of constituent communication as being a legislative function. We've said that it's all right to use staff time to address Christmas cards. We've said it's okay to write letters to high school graduates. I don't know about the people cleaning up Campbell Creek, but -- you know, it's -- that is not the problem here. Listening to Senator Stevens, I couldn't think of a more appropriate thing for a member of the legislature to do. The Ethics Act draws a line between governmental actions and political party, or campaign activities. This letter is on the political party side of that line. This letter, that we're talking about here, thanks Republican residents in Representative Sanders' district for their participation in an exclusively Republican party event. It's not even a part of the state candidate selection process. It wasn't voting at a primary. It wasn't being a delegate to a convention. It was participating in a straw poll on a presidential candidate influence situation. This is a party, a partisan purpose, not a government purpose. Now, Representative Sanders could certainly have written this letter without any complaint from us if he didn't use state resources and money to do so. But what he did use is two staffers significant time. I think it's important to remember here that we're talking about staff time in addition to postage. He used the state letterhead, the authority of his position in this legislature. And if you remember, Senator Jacko got himself in trouble for using his position by -- just by calling up and saying, "Hello, I'm Senator Jacko", it's not even a question of letterhead. And he used his accountable office account. The question that I think the committee and the -- the Rules Committee and the legislature has to consider: Is it all right for a legislator to use his office or position, his employees and the state postage for a political party purpose. In the committee's view, the statute says no. It says you can't use it for a non-governmental purpose. Now, the distinction that Representative Sanders raised between the legislative purpose language we used in our discussion in the -- in the decision is a valid and interesting issue. And I would love to have heard debate about it at the hearing. But we think here, in this case, that distinction between those things is without importance because a party purpose is not a governmental purpose. Representative Sanders raised the point about private benefit. The statute reads, "non-governmental purpose or private benefit." And he's -- in his view, the question was; did that private benefit only mean his financial benefit. The committee has found to the contrary in the past. We found Senator Jacko in violation for using his position, not staff or postage, his position to attract female attention, not a financial benefit, let's put -- say it that way. I think also that you need to look at charges two and three, which are on page 5 of the decision, which I put a paper clip on so I could turn to it right away. And now, let me just read the statutes here for you. In charge three, Representative Sanders required an employee to assist in political party or candidate activities, campaigning or fund raising on government time. I think that -- I don't know how you -- how you individually feel about governmental or non-governmental purpose, but under this section of the statute, which is a separate section, the question is, isn't this a political party activity. And to the committee's way of thinking, it was. Let me also address the questions of sanctions here because I know there's concern that the sanctions seem inappropriately severe given the size of the -- the nature of the violation. There are a couple of things to think about here. First, the committee had no evidence from Representative Sanders about why -- what he thought, what his situation was, whether he -- you know, which part of the handbook he read, or anything like that. He chose to tell us nothing and we were bound to deal with the evidence we had before us. What we did see was a pattern of not only failure to cooperate with the committee but an effort to make the committee go through as many hoops and to spend as much money as possible, as far as I could see, in efforts to keep the committee from functioning. We looked at the prior cases that he'd had. In the first one, Representative Sanders wrote a letter to us in response to a request for corrective action, and in his newsletter to his constituents, he misrepresented what the committee had done. He did it again yesterday. If you read that decision, you see that it was not just a question about him using his -- the note pads, but a question of his using a state employee for his -- to conduct his personal business, to solicit business for his print shop. That is not the story that Representative Sanders tells. So we imposed corrective action in that case. We got a letter, and then we got, essentially, renunciation of that letter. And then in the second case, which was a really minor, minor case, a violation, but tiny, we got a more grudging letter of -- that he would be happy to come to our training, he was glad we invited him. So now, when we had to look at our -- look at sanctions, we knew the first thing we weren't going to do was we weren't going to ask for a letter. We'd been that route a couple of times and it wasn't working. And we thought about -- that what was happening was essentially an injury to the legislators. We were concerned that not only had Representative Sanders spent some amount of state resources, state money, or the public's money, on what we thought was a political party activity, but that he had brought some disrepute on you all. And so we thought an apology to the legislature would be the way to deal with the letter issue; the question of taking responsibility for his actions. The reimbursement, if we had simply asked for reimbursement alone, we were in a situation of allowing someone to buy, or permit to violate the -- to violate the Ethics Act. Oh, gee, I'll violate it and then I'll just pay the money and it'll be all right, and if they don't catch me, I'm fine. So, that alone was not a sufficient sanction. We put in the -- the question about the sanction about using the accountable account or non-accountable account as a preventative matter so we wouldn't have to have that problem come up again. And we asked that he have a written policy about the use of staff time. That's a standard thing we've done in corrective actions, and so forth. So, we came down to -- those were sort of standard corrective actions activities. We felt that given the lack of cooperation and the prior cases on misuse of state resources, some other punitive sanction was appropriate and these are the two we came up with. I have a concern that my appearance here tonight, and my discussing with you frankly, what went into our decisions is bad precedent. I think that exhaustive inquiry into individual committee members and analysis of decisions made time and again, if it were done again, would damage the process; would drive off committee members and destroy the independence that the Ethics Committee has and that you all rely on. I don't want any other chair of any committee to have to do this. I think there's only one other thing I -- I want to say in my remarks. I appreciate the committee's indulgence for letting me talk so long. And this is back to a personal point. I am not Jewish, but there are people dear to me who are, people whose -- who have lost their families in Germany and Eastern Europe under the Nazis. TAPE 97-3, SIDE B Number 001 MS. MACNEILLE (continued): ... think to characterize anything that goes on in this proceeding, or in this legislature as somehow analogous to what happened there is to trivialize their suffering. I know that it's of considerable concern to different ones of you about how to change the legislation or how to change the ethics act -- possible legislative changes. I'm open to questions on that, I've done -- and -- or anything else the committee would like to ask. I thank you for your -- your patience in hearing me. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Thank you. That concludes your testimony, and Susie do you have anything you want to add at this time? SUSIE BARNETT, PROFESSIONAL ASSISTANT, SELECT COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATIVE ETHICS: I'm here to answer questions. REPRESENTATIVE KOTT: I hope the committee has some questions for you. Representative Porter. Number 023 REPRESENTATIVE BRIAN PORTER: Thank you Mr. Chairman. Margie, to say that serving on the Legislative Ethics Committee is a thankless job is probably the understatement of the year, and I have the ability that members of this committee don't have because I served with you for two years. Probably the -- the only benefit that accrues to the public members of the Ethics Committee is that they can't have yard signs ... MS. MACNEILLE: [Indisc.] a benefit, I agree ... REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: ... that is far outweighed by everything else. And I think it's only fair for me -- I feel compelled to say that having served on this committee with the same five public members that are there now that -- that two years was an education process for me on just how difficult these kinds of things can be, especially given, as we noted, I think, in the first thing that came in front of the committee that the statute was woefully full of holes. We had a list when I left about this long of things that we wanted to change and I'm sure it's longer now. And I think as an adjunct to a resolution to this particular thing we would want to re-enter that fray either through this committee or some other - - really take a look at filling those holes so that your job can be a little bit easier. REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: To me this case basically comes down to two things, and that is, one; the merits of the allegation, and two, the participation by Representative Sanders in the process. I guess, I bite my tongue when I say it, but I almost wish that I had been on the committee when this came because I would be really interested in knowing the -- to the extent that you can, the debate and the thought of balancing what on one hand is a pretty important constitutional right of free speech and communication with the notion that governmental, non-governmental activities equals political, equals bi-partisan, which equals a violation. Can you - - I don't know how much of that you can share, but .... Number 122 MS. MACNEILLE: I guess we talk about, you know, what was in the committee's mind. Lots of times I don't have a clue, you know. There are a lot of us and we have a lot of minds. All I can say is what we agree on when we're done. To me, the key here is who paid for the communication, not the communication itself. Do I think it's, generally speaking, without a question of who paid for it. Okay for Representative Sanders to send that letter to people? Sure. Do I think it's okay to use state staff and money to do it? No. And so to me, I don't see a free speech problem, I see a money problem. I hesitate to say what went through everyone else's minds. REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: Well Margie, I don't have any other particular questions except to say I'm sorry that you guys have to go through all of this. We'll get through it and get onto the next one. Number 181 MS. BARNETT: And we had a lovely flight down. It was sunny. It was great. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Further questions? Speaker Phillips. Number 187 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I have lots of questions. MS. MACNEILLE: Good. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: So please bare with me. I'm going to go -- I -- I hope I've written them down as you spoke. The first question I have to ask, and I'll have to jog your memory going back in the record. And I'm looking at a record of the House Joint -- Joint House and Senate Judiciary Committee meetings of February 4th in 1993, and that was a confirmation hearing. And I -- and what I'm going to try to get to in -- in the root of my question is the issue of appearance of conflict of interest. The idea that there is a possible conflict of interest in your position that we did not correct in the law. So that's where I'm going to try to get to in my question. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: In the record, Chairman Taylor, Robin Taylor, Senator Taylor, asked you about your husband's law firm contractual relationship with the state. You replied that you had filed a request for a non-confidential advisory opinion about that confidential -- that contractual relationship. What I want to know is, who did you file that request with? Do you have a copy of that record? Do we have -- can we have a copy of that record? But, who did you file it with? Number 242 MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. I'm -- I'm more than happy to -- to address that. I have -- you have to understand, I -- I don't have an office, I just have my house. I fax everything to everybody so I end up with the originals. I have the original request for the advisory opinion, which is addressed on January 12th, to the Select Committee for Legislative Ethics, which at that point didn't really exist because it didn't have any members. And I telecopied it to Terry Kramer at -- I always get this wrong -- which, Legal Affairs ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Legislative Legal Affairs ... MS. MACNEILLE: ... Legislative Legal, on -- on the 12th day of January 1993. And then -- and my confirmation hearing, I had this in front of me and I read whole chunks of it into the record and discussed it. I remember specifically Senator Taylor saying, "Well, gosh we think Julian's great, go for it", I mean, something like that. There was -- it was clear that that question was raised and -- and there wasn't any particular problem raised. The reason it came up was not addressed specifically as a conflict of interest, but there is this provision in the statute limiting what family members of legislative employees, which we count as, can do as far as the state's concerned. And so there was a -- there was an issue there ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: And that's -- that is the issue I want to get to ... MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. And then ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: ... and you -- and you have said, in your -- in your testimony, you have said that you have requested -- okay, so the first time you asked for a request for an advisory position on whether or not you were in conflict of interest was from the Ethics Committee and from the Legislative Legal Affairs. MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. I filed -- yeah ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: And subsequent years, who did you file that request with? Number 320 MS. MACNEILLE: In April 15, 1993, the Ethics Committee, which by then was functioning, Joe Donahue was the chair, held a meeting about this and issued an advisory opinion which was public and published ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: And so, subsequent years, did you file your request with the Ethics Committee? MS. MACNEILLE: Yes, I did. Number 332 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Mr. Chairman, I think that this is one of the basic problems of what we're dealing with because in no where in the law, that I am able to find, is there ever the provision that it should be a member of the Ethics Committee, going to that Ethics Committee to see if there is a conflict of interest. Certainly that request should have come back to the legislature. The legislature wrote the law. The legislature would have had the intent of the law. And I think that is a basic problem because Mrs. MacNeille, you say you don't have -- MacNeille, I'm sorry -- you don't have any idea of when your husband gets paid or anything -- any of that. But in 1995 your husband received $289,000 from the State of Alaska. And in 1996 he received over $300,000 from the State of Alaska. Now certainly these payments have nothing to do with the -- with the Hickel or the Cowper, or any other administration. They are with the current administration. You are a state employee. Your husband is taking -- I mean, you ... MS. MACNEILLE: I am not a state employee. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: You are not a state employee. But you are -- and -- you are working for the State of Alaska. And in this case there is, in my mind, an appearance of a conflict of interest. The appearance is there. And I think, Mr. Chairman, our problem here is the fact that we didn't make this a specific point at all in the law. We didn't say to the Ethics Committee, if you have a problem with the appearance of a conflict, it must come back to the legislature who wrote the law, who made the intent on the law. And so that's one question. That's one issue. MS. MACNEILLE: Speaker Phillips, I might -- you all reconfirmed me I believe in 1995 ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Right, right ... MS. MACNEILLE: ... so, I've come around again on this issue ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: ... but -- but -- the -- we never received a -- I never saw a formal request, shall you -- shall this be declared a conflict or not. I never saw that. And you know, that's possibly my own fault. MS. MACNEILLE: Well, I -- I just did everything that was in my power to do, to flag the issue and I don't think there are any surprises. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Right, and I'm not -- you know, I'm saying this is something that I think we have a problem in the law, and this needs to be clarified. I have a whole bunch of other questions, Mr. Chairman, can I continue? CHAIRMAN KOTT: At this point I'd like to ask you to hold those in abeyance and we'll take a five minute recess. [The committee went off record at 7:04 p.m. and resumed at 7:17 p.m.] CHAIRMAN KOTT: Call the House Rules Committee back into session and I will again remind you, you're still under oath. Representative Phillips -- Speaker Phillips. Number 445 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Thank you Mr. Chairman. These committees -- or these next questions -- series of questions are going to be on the law itself, so either of you please feel to answer. We all have recognized, over the years, that there exists a problems with decisions -- ethics charges and decisions that come down during a campaign season. And the champaign season let's say being from oh, at least July through the election in November. Have you -- have you investigated whether or not that there is any flexibility in the law itself, or have you come to any kind of conclusions as how the law might be changed that would allow you to take the election season into consideration as you're making your time-lines? And, you know, I can follow your time-line and see that it was almost impossible to get this in. But in the middle of all of these schedules there was an election season and that becomes a very divisive thing on these kind of decisions. So, have you -- have you, as a committee, considered that? Have you thought of any kind of changes that should be made? Anything. MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. I'd love to address that. When I was on, what I call the old committee, under the old ethics law, there was I believe a 30 day -- 45 day, I can't remember, exclusion in the statute that said that the committee couldn't accept any complaints under a certain time period, before the election, and in fact complaints were sent back because of that. REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: Sixty ... MS. MACNEILLE: Sixty. And -- and then this statute doesn't have that in it. I don't think it's -- I'm speaking for myself, personally, because, you know, the committee hasn't formally addressed its legislative package for this year. We were going to do that today at 1:00, except we were in the air. But, for me personally, I don't want to see the Ethics Committee used as a political football. And I don't have any trouble. I think it's a fine idea to have some kind of blackout period before the election on accepting complaints. The last thing that I want to see as an Ethics Committee member is somebody filing the week before election, you know, getting a lot of press out of it, and then we're left to clean up the mess, you know, much later. And maybe it's garbage, maybe it's not. And it can be used -- the -- we can be offensively and defensively, and I don't want to be used either way. So, I think that -- that should the legislature choose to do that, it would probably be a good idea. I would be concerned if there were some kind of moratorium put on the committee doing anything because July to November, or some period like that is, you know, a big chunk of the year. I -- I was joking about [indisc.-- coughing.] like halibut openers, you know, we have 24 hours to get complaints in and then we'll close it cause elections -- the primaries, the elections -- I think the legislature has to balance the functioning of the committee with the size of the blackout period you wanted to use. But I -- I share your concern, and -- my personal point of view, an amendment like that would be a great idea. Number 595 CHAIRMAN KOTT: Any further questions? Number 598 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: And again, on the law as it -- the law that we have on the books today that you must operate under -- and I want to go to the subject of the hearing officer or the arbitrator or the master and, you know, whatever you're going to call that person. And I understand that you made a request of Representative Sanders' attorney to -- to get with you on -- go through the names, and to get with you -- and so there was a time- line involved there. They couldn't do it within a certain period of time. I think what I'm trying to get to -- does the law allow you to, independently, make that decision on who that person will be? Or is the law not specific -- I mean, is the law specific or not, that both parties should be taken into consideration when you make the choice on the arbitrator or the master, or the hearings officer as is the normal case when you are doing arbitration. You have an agreement from both. But, does our law not cover that? Is the law not clear on that? MS. MACNEILLE: The statute says we can hire people, but doesn't say anything about hearing officers. We have procedures which were adopted, you know, back on the senate side, when we were in that -- in that formal hearing, about how we select hearing officers. And it provides that we give a list to both sides, and that our decision is final. We haven't ever -- we've only chosen them twice, but we haven't ever chosen somebody -- say we couldn't have, you know, beforehand, we've never gone through someone marked off. So .... Number 678 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: So that it would be a -- possibly another area of the law that we should be looking at, as far as clarifying what -- the process. MS. MACNEILLE: If -- if you wanted to, sure. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Yeah. Okay. Number 688 CHAIRMAN KOTT: On that point, since we're talking about hearing officers, when you selected Mr. White as the hearing officer, was there any consideration given to the fact that he may be politically connected, or made political contributions, or was somewhat or somehow involved with a political party, or anything of the nature, or perhaps even a conflict of interest? I mean, do you go through that litany of discussion? I seem to recall that there was some contributions given. MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. Let me go back to our time-line here. October 8th we sent the list out to -- to Mr. Syren and Mr. Spaan, and that was the day that Susie started contacting the people on that list. As I said, it was an old list we had from the Jacko proceeding, to -- to ask each one if they were available [indisc.] charge, and whether they would have any political involvement, or any problem with living up to the part of the statute that says, if you're an employee of the committee you can't do it, you can't make contributions, you can't put up yard signs. You know, the whole -- the whole thing, and Susie can tell you about her discussions with the people on the committee -- on the -- on the list, particularly Mr. White. MS. BARTLETT: With each of the people that are ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: Susie, would you identify yourself for the ... Number 754 MS. BARNETT: Susie Barnett, Staff to the Legislative Ethics Committee. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Thanks. MS. BARNETT: With the people that I contacted from -- the list was originally developed three years ago and has been changed due to people moving, etcetera. When I talked to them I would ask them if they first had any conflicts in this case with Representative Sanders: Did they give money to his opponent, did they give money to him, did they -- were they involved in his opponent's campaign or his campaign. So that was, of course, key importance. Also, then, I asked them about whether they had any conflicts with Lester Syren, Representative Sanders' attorney, and then further conflicts are, are you involved in legislative campaigns, are you -- you know, the code reads legislative campaigns. No, no, no. Do you make contributions, have you made -- and I want to be clear about this because my question to them is, have you made contributions to political campaigns. MS. BARNETT: So I come -- I cleanse the list and go through and find people who, yes, at this point in time, you know, actually no one on the list had any conflicts with Representative Sanders or his opponents. Some people had said, yes, I'm actively involved in so and so's campaign, or such and such -- or, you know, I've become involved. So, I end up with a list. Mike White specifically was on that list. No conflicts. Now, I did not ask Mike White -- it didn't even occur to me with any of these people. And certainly it's something I will do in the future. But to say, does your firm contribute to -- so that there is a clarification there that -- that I -- I would not want to have anyone be mislead that, that ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Porter. Number 850 REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: Just to that point, you won't have to because the law has changed now and firms will not be able to make [indisc.--simultaneous-laughter]. MS. BARNETT: Well, thanks. One last thing to do. I like that. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Elton. Number 858 REPRESENTATIVE KIM ELTON: Mr. Chair, something you can help me out with maybe before I decide whether to ask a follow-up question or not. I mean, I'm -- I'm experiencing a certain amount of unease that we're straying from H96-02, and into things that maybe should be discussed, but maybe discussed in another forum. I mean, I appreciate the fact that this is a relatively new ethics procedure, and hopefully that it evolves over time. But I'm not sure about the relevance of -- of the process and what we can do to -- to -- to fine tune the law in front of us. And so I'd like to have you maybe explain what the latitudes are here, and then I'll make up mind whether I need to ask a follow-up question. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Well certainly, since we are dealing with a time- line, we have -- we have discussed Mr. White as the hearing officer. I have given this committee, and Margie, some latitude in straying. When you stray too far you'll know. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Okay. But I don't think this strays too far then, Mr. Chair, if -- if I can ask a follow-up question then. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Please. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: What -- what would have happened if Representative Sanders, or Mr. Syren, his attorney, had said, "You know, look it, I think we have a problem with Mr. White." Would -- would Mr. White have been struck at that point in time, or would you have had to make another determination, either at the staff level or the committee level, on whether or not to strike Mr. White or would he have just been gone? Number 940 MS. MACNEILLE: I'll speak to that cause I was the -- I was the person with the buck at that time. If, on October 11th, either Mr. Syren or Mr. Spaan had sent a list saying, you know, not this person, not this person, not this person, I would have gone from the people that were listed. After October 11th, after I had made the selection, Representative Sanders' attorney did raise what I thought was way too tenuous a claim of conflict that -- that Michael White had. But if just for -- you know, for whatever reason, I had gotten back the list on October 11th and Mike White scratched off, I wouldn't have used him, you know. I was looking for somebody [indisc.--coughing] I turned away from David Stewart, who -- who I knew would do a good job, to try and go as far as they could to have no appearance of problem. And -- and I -- I just -- I was trying to make this as easy and smooth as I could. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Number 995 CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Phillips ... REPRESENTATVE PHILLIPS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: ... Speaker Phillips. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Again, this -- either one of you answer this because it pertains to the law itself, and unfortunately in my opinion, one of the great ambiguities of the law, which is only our fault, only ours because we wrote the law. It is the issue of the definition of non-governmental purpose, versus your interpretation of legislative purpose. Do the law -- in your mind, is the law clear on what you can determine to be a non-governmental purpose and then you came in and used the definition, legislative purpose, and I'm wondering where did you pick up legislative purpose. I think the statute says non-governmental purpose. But in your -- in your understanding of the law itself, is there any definition of those two terms, and -- and why did you choose legislative versus non-governmental? MS. MACNEILLE: Let me see if I can answer that. Is there definition of non-governmental purpose? No. I mean, it's -- the thing that the Ethics Committee struggles with all the time, and you all get impatient with us, and -- and I don't blame you, is that this is a, you know, the whole thing is a fuzzy area. There's no way -- it says in the preamble itself, there is no way you can describe all the circumstances and every day people come up with things and put Susie on the spot, say, well what about this situation. You're going to have to try and figure it out. It is exceedingly difficult to draw any kind of black and white line. The question is, did we, in this decision, inappropriately, you know, shift from non-governmental to legislative. I -- you know, when I heard that yesterday I thought, well gosh, what's -- you know, let me think about that. [Indisc.--coughing.] And I think it's an issue we need to discuss as a committee. But when I looked at what we did in this case, in this case I don't think there's a difference. I can imagine cases where there is a difference. And, you know, we'll stick to our knitting then, we'll go back to non- governmental, but it doesn't mean it's easy to define. And that's a problem with this. Number 1127 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: And the next point that I wanted to bring on this issue, I think, is the biggest question of all that must be answered. If we were not a legislator, we would not be doing these -- these deeds. If we were not a legislator, we would not be sending a letter to a constituent thanking them for being part of a process. I would not be sending a letter to high school graduates congratulating them on getting a diploma and sending them a voter registration form. I would not be sending letters to longevity bonus recipients advising them of something going on in the process. If we were not legislators we would not be doing that. Therefore, you carry the argument to the fact that we are legislators. This becomes part of our legislative or governmental responsibility. And I think that is -- really begs a clarification -- main clarification, because we wouldn't be doing these things if we weren't legislators. MS. MACNEILLE: I think that we have to be careful in using that analysis because if you say that you -- you wouldn't do it unless you were a legislator, and therefore, if you are a legislator and you do it, it's okay, you don't need us. You're there. You know, everything you all do as legislatures is -- must be because of your legislative status, and -- and so it's alright. If that's the test you use, you know, it's -- it -- it doesn't give any guidance or -- or comfort to the public about the use of resources. Number 1226 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: I think everything we -- we've put on the record, and every thing we asked brings up more of the problems that we have. And you are absolutely right, because every time an issue is raised, the law is being interpreted and clarified. And there's no other process of getting to that point unless we make these clarifications. Mr. Chairman, I have one more question that I'd like to ask, and then I'll wait and see if anybody else asks. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Please. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: You made a statement in your closing remarks that you were very, very uncomfortable, and that you believed that this was setting bad precedence that you are here before us this evening. That this is not the way the process should operate; that the Ethics Committee, itself, should be protected and -- and stay separate from the legislative function. What do you feel would be an appropriate change to the law to protect the process? MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. I'm -- I'm sorry, I guess I didn't make myself clear, because I do think it's appropriate for the House to refer this to a committee and -- Rules Committee -- the Rules Committee to -- to look at it. What I was being uncomfortable about is that tonight I've been a whole lot more forthcoming and explaining what it was that went on in my mind, and other people's minds, that I've ever done by any ethics thing before. You know, just to inferiorate reporters and not -- you know, say nothing, and nothing and nothing. And I'm just hoping that after this effort to -- to really open up what we've done, that it won't be needed in the future. And that -- that further chairs of subcommittees won't have to go through this detailed a process. That's -- that was my concern, not that it was inappropriate for you all to have ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Are you referring to the detailed process on defining your time-line? Because certainly, these questions that we're putting on the record, are a part of the ... MS. MACNEILLE: Oh, yeah ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: ... process that needs to be addressed. MS. MACNEILLE: No, I'm -- I'm not -- I'm -- I'm not suggesting at all that your -- the questions are inappropriate. I'm happy to the arrangement ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: So you're talking about ... MS. MACNEILLE: ... I'm happy to discuss ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: ... the detail on the time-line. MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. And the stuff that I volunteered. I just feel like it was incumbent on me, given what had gone on in this committee before, to make that kind of detailed defense of the committee. But I was hoping that in the future that -- that kind of thing wouldn't be necessary. I'm not suggesting that there should be some legislative change to prevent that from happening, because I came here voluntarily and opened my mouth and talked, you know. I may have said a lot more things than I should have said. I don't know. There's -- on that line, there's one more thing I must say because I forgot to say it before. I wanted to thank the committee deeply for choosing not to stay in executive session yesterday. And for having Representative Sanders have this discussion of me in public because these concerns had been circulating for some time. And I really appreciate the opportunity to address them in public, and not have them dealt with in secret. And I -- I really want to thank each and everyone of you for that. Number 1410 REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Thanks, Mr. Chair. I -- I -- I too have a series of questions, but -- but I -- I think I want to say first that I agree with Representative Phillips about the nub of the questions on being, is this an activity that we would have done if we weren't in the legislature. And -- and I don't -- I think it's difficult to assume what the deliberations were. It -- it is -- as we begin the process of making the deliberations and executive session after -- after the hearing. But I'm -- I guess one of the things that I would have assumed would have happened, because I think most of us on this panel probably cringed yesterday when we were asked, what happens if you send a letter of congratulations to high school -- graduating high school seniors. Most of us have done that. And I guess, upon reflection, I -- I -- I thought, well, maybe the difference is that I sent it to the entire class of graduating seniors, and I didn't send it just to republicans, or just to democrats, or just to -- in my case, there are two house districts and graduating seniors are from both. But -- but that I would have been okay if I had sent the letter to all the graduates. But I may not have been okay if I sent it only to high school graduates who had registered as democrats. Is -- is that a fair assumption on my part? MS. MACNEILLE: I'll answer, and then Susie, the one who has to deal these things to get answer. I -- I think the thing about the letter is not just who it went to but what it was about, which is a republican party function. I don't care about republican, I mean, it could be democrat or green party function. It was a -- a party function. I think that if you want to send, you know, some kind of letter to some select group of your constituents, and you want to talk to them about some particular, you know, some particular [indisc.--coughing], that's fine. It's just -- I don't -- in this case, this has to do with, are you sending them a letter about political party activity. And that's the -- the focus. It's not -- you know, that's the problem. And it's the use of the state money. And the question whether you would do this if you weren't a legislator, if you weren't a legislator you wouldn't have state employees to use to do this. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Mr. Chair, do you want me to just keep going? CHAIRMAN KOTT: Please. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Thanks, Mr. Chair. What would have happened, if at anytime prior to the hearing Representative Sanders, or his attorney, came to staff or -- or came to the committee and said, "You know, I'm really confused. I thought what I did was okay. Can somebody explain to me what the possible problem is? And if -- if there is a problem, what can I do to fix it?" What -- what would have happened? MS. MACNEILLE: You know, the old "what if" question. We wouldn't be here, you know. That's my view. I, personally, longed for some way to get this thing resolved other than going through this. And some way to some kind of communication. But the method that was chosen was, you know, full-dress combat. And people make choices about that, and you -- and you end up with results from them. But ... Number 1636 MS. BARNETT: And -- and if I could ... MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah ... MS. BARNETT: ... add -- add to this. One of the things that -- that we certainly have done on an informal basis is, if somebody -- for example, I got mailed, inadvertently, someone's newsletter. It had a campaign picture on it. I didn't run to the committee and say, let's go get these people. I walked up to the legislator's office and said, this is the kind of thing that could, potentially, get you into trouble. Here's why, you know, and we had a good discussion about it. End of story. Those things, prevention and education, are a huge part of our responsibility. So we aren't out -- my job is not to go out and say, okay, here's a violation, here's violation, here's a violation. If Representative Sanders had walked into me prior to any of this, and talked prior to writing the letter and talked about the letter, we wouldn't be here. We've spent a lot of time giving -- I spend a tremendous amount of time providing informal advise. If, in fact, I had told him that the letter was okay -- if he came in and said, "What do you think about this letter?" And -- and -- and if I had said to him, looks okay to me, go for it. Then he and I would have been at the table together in front of the committee. And I would be sitting in his defense. It might surprise him, but I would be glad to be there because that, I believe, is my responsibility. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: And there's been some allusion to this and I don't know how to say it. But -- but, reading the transcript -- and I -- I got the impression that the -- the process was incredibly complicated. And -- and may have been complicated by the presence of attorneys. And -- and so, you -- you're an attorney, right? MS. MACNEILLE: [Indisc.--Simultaneous-laughter]. ... you want to give, I'm used to it. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: I -- I -- tried -- I tried to figure out how to frame this question. During the transcript, and in the transcript -- I mean, there was -- there was discussion about a lot of things that I, frankly, don't understand. I mean, contempt and taking the Fifth, and -- and a lot of other things. And -- and I guess one of the questions that I had about the process is -- this is kind of a two-part question, Mr. Chair. First, is it usual for an attorney to represent a -- a -- a person that's a subject of a complaint, as well as witnesses that -- that may shed light on the complaint? Is it normal for an attorney to represent that span of clients? MS. MACNEILLE: Not in my experience. But not -- you understand my experience is sort of odd, I mean, I'm a public utility wire, you know. So it's ... REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: And I don't expect you to go any further. The second part of the question is -- and again, it -- it doesn't matter to me if you laugh at what I say next because I don't know the rules. But -- but -- but my understanding of -- of the Fifth - - and part of that understanding came about through the transcript. That by taking the Fifth is -- the only reason you can take the Fifth is a realistic fear of -- of criminal prosecution. And -- and I wonder if part of your discussions -- since part of your charge is to look at whether or not there's been corroboration. I wonder if part of the discussion included any -- any decision, on the committee's part, as to whether or not the Fifth was inappropriately taken by any of the people that appeared before the committee. MS. MACNEILLE: Well, we were fortunate in that regard to have Mr. White because, you know, he -- he'd been a judge, he'd been a criminal lawyer, he'd been a district attorney, he'd seen a lot of people take the Fifth. And he stated to us, various times, he thought that this was appropriately taken, and I can't remember if he said whether it was not appropriately taken. But what our decision says and what we did was, we decided that taking the Fifth didn't have anything do to with cooperation. That that decision, made by Representative Sanders, and his cooperation, was the only thing that we had to look at under the statute. Witnesses are, you know, irrelevant to us -- that we were not going to hold that against him. Whether or not he -- you know, that was a good decision or not. It wasn't our decision, it was his decision and we weren't -- we not only were not going to infer anything for his taking it, which we were permitted to do, but we did not. We weren't going to say that taking the Fifth was a lack of cooperation. And so, we -- you know, we said, essentially, fine, take the fifth, and -- and that's -- that's not going to be something the committee considers as lack of cooperation, or -- or giving us any evidentiary basis at all. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: That kind of -- Mr. Chair, I just have two more questions and -- and one of them, I think, was partially answered. So, I'm to understand that in your deliberations on the guilt portion, as opposed to the sanction portion, that -- that taking -- the invocation of the Fifth didn't influence your deliberations on establishing the guilt portion. Number 1894 MS. MACNEILLE: That's right. On -- on page 2 of our decision it says; Although the committee is permitted, as a matter of law, to draw inferences from their -- Representative Sanders and his staff -- doing so, it did not do so in making it's findings and reaching it's decision. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: And -- and I can then assume, also, that when you deliberated about the sanctions that you also ... MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah ... REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: ... accept the [indisc.-simultaneous-speech] ... MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. On page -- bottom of page 5 -- and I'll just read from the decision; In several areas, Representative Sanders' view of the applicable law is different than that of the committee's. Specifically, -- the judicial branch stuff -- and whether one person can claim the Fifth Amendment privilege against self incrimination to avoid testimony that might incriminate another person. The subject doesn't have to agree with the committee to be considered cooperative. And the committee does not hold these differences of opinion against Representative Sanders. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: And -- and the last question for now, Mr. Chair -- and that kind of gets to process, and -- and -- and it would be helpful to me if you could clarify the process. I guess the assumption that I have made, in the past, is that the Ethics Committee, or the Ethics Subcommittee, in -- in this case, which has been characterized, through testimony, as -- as being both the prosecutor and the jury. I have viewed the process a little bit differently. That the -- the Ethics Subcommittee is not the final jury and -- and is maybe not the jury. But -- but this body is the jury, and -- and -- and so if we separate what our body is expected to do, that would be the judicial function, based on recommendations that came from the Ethics Subcommittee. Is that a -- am I misunderstanding the process, or is -- is it more complicated than that? MS. MACNEILLE: No, I -- I think that's a way to put it. I think you all are more than the jury. I think you're it, you know. I mean, juries have certain limited roles, they find facts and judges find law and I think you do the whole thing. And what we are is some kind of preliminary screener. And it is -- Representative Porter can tell you, it is no fun doing this stuff. It is no fun for legislators, particularly, to have to sit in judgment on their peers. And it is no fun for -- for you legislators to try and do it yourselves. I think you -- you have all kinds of -- you know, personally uncomfortable issues and political issues, and appearance issues, and so that, in my view is -- is why we're in this process too. But the ultimate decision is yours. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Mr. Chair, I -- I promised only one more question, but ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: You're quarter's about running out. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Pardon me? CHAIRMAN KOTT: You've got your 25 cents worth. Number 2259 REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Just -- just one more, and -- and it's one that I skipped over here. I guess I've assumed when -- when you talk about the decision of the subcommittee, and when you began your opening remarks by saying that -- that some members of the committee would be offended by the notion that somebody else was leading them. I -- I've assumed that the decision of the subcommittee was a unanimous decision. Is that a -- is -- is my inference correct? MS. MACNEILLE: We don't record our votes. And so -- and -- and that's our policy. So I can't say yes, it was unanimous, or no, there was one person against it but I can't tell who it is. I mean, I just can't say. And there is a policy reason for that which has to do with the legislators who are on the committee not being having to -- you know, stand up and state; send my -- my esteemed colleague down the drain here. But how can I say what I want to say when I can't say what I want to say? This committee wrote its own decision and we all worked on it. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Porter. REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: The dilemma that Margie just had, unfortunately -- excuse me, I'm chewing ice water, go through this whole discussion because there are steps throughout this entire process that are confidential. They're frustrating for this kind of a review, from my experience, and ... [TAPE CHANGE] TAPE 97-4, SIDE A Number 000 REPRESENTATIVE PORTER (continued): ... and then make up our minds whether we would have agreed with -- with their decision on that violation. I wish we would have had the benefit of the full discussion earlier, but -- but we can't because you just can't do that. So I guess, as much as I'd like to, I'm ready to move on. Number 052 CHAIRMAN KOTT: I've got just one or two questions here since it's now coming to my turn. It seems to me, on the report, there was some discussion about the recommendations for sanctions that -- and that those sanctions could be recommended based on Representative Sanders not cooperating. Am I on the right track so far? MS. MACNEILLE: Uh-huh. CHAIRMAN KOTT: And you, essentially, suggested to the committee that as failure to -- to cooperate was not associated with, in essence, this particular case by virtue of him pleading the Fifth. Is that still correct? MS. MACNEILLE: Yes. I guess I should say that the lack of cooperation we considered and enhancing recommended sanctions was outside, or separate from the question of taking the Fifth 'cause it -- well, with taking the Fifth, it wasn't considered in our -- our lack of cooperation finding. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Were there other areas regarding the lack of cooperation in this particular manner that was taken into consideration? Number 160 MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. And I think we have to talk about that -- we refer to in -- on page 6, that we've reviewed the pleadings and correspondence in the case since the probable cause determination. We saw a pattern of delaying and obstructing tactics, including lack of compliance with the hearing officer's orders, which constitutes a lack of cooperation. And there's something I want to add to that. There's been a lot of press made about how much this proceeding cost compared to the size of the offense. The reason that this -- we had to spend so much money on lawyers in this was dealing with the continual delaying and obstructive tactics that are talked about here. It's not our choice, and not, I think, a mandatory part of any particular proceeding. The question, I think, that we thought was at issue is, is the Ethics Committee permitted, or is it appropriate for us to back off and -- and go away when it looks like someone's going to make a fuss and cost a lot of money. Is that a leeway that we have to say, you know, is it cost effective. And we didn't feel that -- that it was appropriate or permitted under the law to -- to be intimidated out of doing what we thought was our job. Number 290 CHAIRMAN KOTT: I'm not too familiar with the -- the legal process and all the steps involved, but since Representative Sanders was represented by counsel, and you've suggested that there was some lack of compliance, or stalling tactics involved, isn't that kind of what's part of what I would call the judicial process in -- in any proceeding, those kinds of discussions or tactics, or whatever you might want to call them? Number 329 MS. MACNEILLE: I thought that -- well, let's see ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: And you're talking to a layman here. MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah, I know -- I know. I guess the question is, isn't this just standard litigation, and you know, in standard litigation, delaying and obstructive tactics, well, maybe. But in standard litigation is the question is whether the subject cooperates part of -- part of the analysis. To me this seemed beyond even the -- the norm, but regardless, the question is, you know, the statutory thing you have to consider cooperation and it - - it wasn't there. You know, it wasn't -- if Representative Sanders had said in the beginning, "Look, I think you guys are -- are wrong headed, just go ahead without me. I'll just, you know, deal with it later at the House", we could have done it a lot cheaper than the way we -- than the way we had to go. Number 455 CHAIRMAN KOTT: Thank you. I have one other question and -- and maybe my assumption, or what I heard you testify earlier on is -- tell me I'm wrong, and if I am off base please correct me but, seems like you did mention -- and I'm going back to the -- the law, itself, regarding the letter. It seems like you mentioned that the contents of the letter was okay, but the conveyance of, was the problematic area, that being using state resources. Is -- is that correct, or .... Number 494 MS. MACNEILLE: If the letter had been done without using state resources, it would have nothing to do with us. That'd be fine. If the letter had -- had in addition to what it had, some discussion of legislation or, you know, something that tied this into the legislature or, you know, state government even, that would have been okay. So, there -- there are a couple different ways the letter could have been okay, but, as it's written, if there had been no use of state resources in producing it, not -- you know, not our problem. CHAIRMAN KOTT: And that -- that somewhat brings me to my next question which is extremely confusing to me in this section of law, and if I might just read the first part of it, and it is in the same area, "Unless approved by the committee, state funds, other than funds to which a legislator is entitled to as an office allowance, may not be used to print or distribute mass mailings". I mean, aren't we at somewhat of a dichotomy here, there's a dilemma in -- in the statute, some ambiguity? On the one hand we're saying one thing, and then the hand we're condoning the other. Number 585 MS. MACNEILLE: When you heard Representative Sanders say [indisc.] you know, he -- if -- if he had looked at page 13 of the handbook about mass mailings and stuff there, I wasn't clear whether that was the testimony that he had, but if -- but -- I thought, gosh I wish we could have been, you know, in on this process somewhere because to my view, a mass mailing is sort of a bigger pool of constituents. A mass mailing about the wrong thing is still a problem. This says that any kind of mass mailing, no matter whether it's completely about the, you know, the education budget or something like that is -- has a blackout period. Now, I'm going to look at Susie and she's going to tell me whether I'm way off base. Number 637 MS. BARNETT: No that's -- that's correct. But these -- in this case we are talking about committee funds. It's a specific -- taking the additional funds that you have access to as finance committee chair, for example, and putting out a mailing about your work as chair of the finance committee, during that blackout period of time, it's -- they're too different types of monies. It is saying, you with that extra access to committee funds can't do it during that period of time. That's the way I've interpreted that piece. Number 680 CHAIRMAN KOTT: I can -- I can understand that interpretation based on, unless approved by the committee's state funds, and I would interpret that the same way you're interpreting it. That is funds that are held by a committee chair, for whatever purpose, which I am not aware, other than maybe the finance committee who has that available to them, but then it goes on to say, "other than funds to which a legislator is entitled to as an office allowance may not be used." Other than those so that .... Number 716 MS. BARNETT: There is certainly, if I could step in here, ... MS. MACNEILLE: Please. MS. BARNETT: ... no intent that your -- for example, end -- this is my understanding the way this statute was written, that your end of the session newsletters, there's a -- those are not restricted. And -- and that's the way I read the statute. Number 740 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Mr. Chairman, could I follow-up on that? CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Phillips. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Thank you. The -- the statute is clear. It says, "However a legislator's personal office allowance may be used for these mass mailings at any time". So had the money that goes into our -- our office accounts been used for this mass mailing, where the statute says, "However the office allowance may be used for these mass mailings at any time", would you have found the same findings on this mailing? MS. MACNEILLE: I'm sorry. I'm starting to fuss after ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: The statute says ... MS. MACNEILLE: Okay, can you refer me to ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: It's 24.60.030(c), and is says, "State money may not be used to print or distribute a mass mailing from, or about a legislator who is a candidate for state office", and that was questioned, "during a period beginning 90 days before the primary, ending a day after the general election, special election. However, a legislator's personal office allowance may be used for these mass mailings at any time." Number 810 MS. MACNEILLE: See if -- if it had read that way, and Representative Sanders had said to us, "Hey, this section (c) is [indisc.]", you know, or we had looked at it, would we still be having a problem here. Number 863 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Well, it is in the statute. This is the statute. MS. MACNEILLE: It just ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: So ... MS. MACNEILLE: ... I mean, yeah, I think that ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: ... this -- this is the statute that we are dealing with, so ... MS. MACNEILLE: I'm sorry. I understood you to rephrase it a little differently, I think. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: No, I -- I'm reading -- anyway, it says, "However, a legislator's personal office allowance may be used for these mass mailings at any time." Why did that not be taken into consideration in doing this mailing? MS. MACNEILLE: I'm sorry. My statute doesn't read that way ... MS. BARNETT: Neither of us ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: It's on page 13. [Indisc.--Simultaneous-speech.] MS. BARNETT: Oh, you're [indisc.] ... MS. MACNEILLE: Oh -- oh, I'm sorry. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Which is -- looks like it's rephrased ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Mass mailings use of state funds -- use of state funds. So, had -- had ... MS. MACNEILLE: [Indisc.] about a legislator ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: ... had this mailing been paid out of the personal office account, then there would not have been any cause for any concern? Number 909 MS. MACNEILLE: Yes, and no. First, the question is use of staff time. If this mailing had been done not on government time ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: But -- but this statute does not say that. It says, "However a legislator's personal office allowance can be used for these mass mailings at any time." A mass mailing has to take somebody to produce the mass mailing. It has to take somebody to put postage on and distribute it to the post office. I mean, those are all the steps that are involved in a mass mailing. MS. MACNEILLE: I -- I thought you were talking about the postage question, which I think this -- this seems to be personal office allowance has to deal with. I don't understand that a personal office allowance is being used to -- to fund the staff-time for the mass mailings. I understand this to say, a mass mailing from, or about a legislator who's a candidate for -- for state office. I, you know, I -- I'm sorry I ... Number 976 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: From a legislator. This would be a mass mailing from a legislator to his constituents. In this case, we are talking about a mass mailing from a legislator to his constituents. The question I'm asking is, had he used his personal office allowance to fund this, then it would have been appropriate according -- according to my interpretation of this statute. MS. BARNETT: But -- but it doesn't negate (b), up above, which is the political party activity. So ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: This -- this statute does not clarify that. MS. BARNETT: But -- but one is not -- they don't, I mean, it doesn't negate this -- this ... MS. MACNEILLE: I think you have to read them both together. MS. BARNETT: Right. You have to read -- and -- and -- and because one part -- in any part of the code you have to address all the parts of the code [indisc.--coughing] activities, and in our interpretations. So a political party -- I was trying to think, Representative Phillips, earlier today about this kind of question 'cause I think it is confusing, and mailings are important and your communication with your constituents is important. If we were to say -- and looking at; is it okay to send out invitations to the Bartlett Club Forum on staff time with -- with office allowance money. I believe that everyone in here would say; no, that's not okay, that's not why we have staff. Where do you draw the line on these kinds of mailings and use of state resources. One of the ways has been put into the code, and that's political party activity. Number 1003 CHAIRMAN KOTT: And is of the opinion, at least of the committee, that sending correspondence to a constituent who participated, after the fact he receives, or she receives a letter, is in fact it involved with political activity? That's the problem -- the trouble I'm having is trying to put the two together. Number 1105 MS. MACNEILLE: I that's a difference between participating and a national spelling bee. Participating in an exclusive partisan, you know, political party activity. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Recognizing the fact that 30 seconds before that person went to the straw poll he could have been of any party affiliation, but because it's unregulated by state law, it's controlled, primarily, through procedures developed by a party, that person then must change his party affiliation or registration to one or the other to participate. Number 1143 MS. MACNEILLE: I don't understand the republican straw poll and, you know, we had to work with the evidence we had and testimony of the republican party official who testified. I didn't understand it to be a -- you know, an official part of the election process. I understood it to be something -- in fact, you know, an effective and imaginative thing to do to deal with republican party influence in Alaska in -- in national -- in national politics. And I don't think that that's a governmental purpose. It may be a desirable purpose. It may be valuable, but I don't think if it's a governmental purposes. Number 1195 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Mr. Chairman, one follow-up and then ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: Speaker Phillips ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: ... I won't belabor the -- the fact any longer. Government is partisan. Government in Alaska is made up of republicans and democrats; used to have some green parties, used to have some libertarians, but we don't right now. Government in Alaska, today, is made up of republicans and democrats. It is a partisan thing. And when the whole government process goes through, it is the public making a selection between republicans and democrats, whether it's at the presidential level, or the state level or the local -- no, not the local level; presidential level or the state level. So it is partisan. That is the nature of government. I think we have a real can of worms here. MS. MACNEILLE: An now it's yours. It's not ours. CHAIRMAN KOTT: I agree. Kind of chasing this horse by its tail. Representative Williams. Number 1257 REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I -- all -- all of that aside, Representative Elton played the 'if game' here. He -- so I think -- and the Chairman let him go along with it, you went along with it. CHAIRMAN KOTT: You'll know -- you'll know when you get too far beyond the 'if'. REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAMS: I understand. I've been in the campaign that started in -- when I left this legislature last June 7th, I guess it was I was campaigning, and I know what it's like to campaign. I campaigned from June through November, everyday. And for me to get off and focus on something that we're having trouble here trying to interpret -- here in this committee where we've had -- how long -- and there's no pressure on us other than these -- the news. We're not -- our only pressure is just whether or not we're going to say things right and not hurt anybody's feelings. I'm not here to want to hurt anybody's feelings. I'm not here to say that you did something wrong, or anything. But I would like to play the 'if game' also. Now I look at what the case review that you -- in Exhibit E, that come up with that -- that was done on April 19th, and Representative Sanders said he felt that there was political under-current on -- on this. Let's say there was, okay? And I'm not saying that you did it ... MS. MACNEILLE: I understand ... REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAMS: ... but, let -- let's say that there was some political under-current. I look at -- I've called meetings in -- in together by -- you know, Indian politics is probably the hardest one to give it to because I've dealt with it 20 years in the City of Saxon and in the Cape Fox Corporation, and I know how hard it is to get people together. But let's say if there was -- I -- I'm looking at this in -- in Jerry's eyes right now, and I'm saying that -- and you're having a hard time trying to get all of these meetings together. You tried on June 7th to get a meeting together, and I can agree with those legislators that they had a week off, you know, three weeks off actually. You know, they went home and they probably all played around, at least those two legislators did, you know, and okay. Well, you know, I think we should have said, if you would have been a little bit more stern as a leader, that you are, and said, we are going to have a meeting on this day because this is very important. We have election coming up. We all know that election is coming up, and we all know how this affected the election, or could have affected the election, that that undercurrent was there. And I'm not saying that it was, but it -- it looks like it to me. Okay. Being it in this manner, saying, okay, "I'm the chairman, we're going to have a -- a meeting and it's going to be on teleconference on this day -- on July 1st. And -- well, let's get -- get this moving so that Representative Sanders, if there is anything that is going to affect him in the -- in the primary, or the election, that it wouldn't bother him." I look at how you've made your portion of cooperation of Representative Sanders in -- in there that -- his tactics, or whatever, but -- and -- and you went through all of these areas that he's fighting you with this and he's arguing about that, and then he's also running a campaign. You know, I know how it is to run a campaign and be threatened by that campaign. We are egos out there on the line, whatever is out there on the line, big time. So you're not really thinking correctly. Okay. How -- could you have done it differently? Could you have come around and said -- been a little bit -- been a little bit more stronger in your leadership? Number 1489 MS. MACNEILLE: I'm sure I could have been a lot stronger in my leadership. Sometimes I've been accused of being too strong. And I'm, you know -- and I don't feel like I'm -- I'm a strong leader at all, I'm just kind of trying to be a sheep dog, keep these people going. But there's one thing I want to say about the Ethics Committee and elections. If we try and speed stuff up because of elections, we're accused of taking a partisan position. If we try and slow things down because of elections, we're -- we're accused of -- of we help one side or the other. We just had to just do it and -- and try not to do it. Try not to sway things one way or the other. Now, I understand what you're saying, and I -- if I've -- I wish there -- there was some handle I had over, specifically, legislators on the Ethics Committee to make them show up because I don't. You know, I can beg, I can plead, I can order. I don't have any power over you people. Susie can be the most assiduously polite and careful staff person suggesting that they really need to show up. And I have begged and pleaded over the phone with people to try and get them to come to meetings. And they have -- you know, appropriately, you all have your lives and paths to live, and I don't have any handle over that. I can't subpoena you to -- you know, to show up at a meeting. Was there some way I could have had a meeting sooner? Not that I know if, but, I -- I'm, you know, I'm sure in the realm of human existence, there's somebody who could have made it happen. Number 1576 MS. BARNETT: I just wanted to add one. The committee, in these formally adopted procedures, also, early on, decided they could not discuss confidential cases over teleconference for a variety of reasons. So it actually does require face-to-face. That also brings that if there is more than one case out there, we have to coordinate several other things. It's not always just one case. And -- and then speaking on the committee's behalf, there -- there was no indication from Representative Sanders as to whether speeding up, or slowing down was what he would prefer. REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAMS: Uh-huh. Well, I could appreciate where Representative Sanders was coming, as far as paying attention to what was happening here and -- on this Ethics Committee. I mean, when you're campaigning that's basically all you look at, is campaigning. And -- and we don't have time to worry about what's happening here. I would liked to have been -- I bet we would all liked to have said, okay, you know, we all understand. And you answered the question earlier when you said if we -- we would have left it if -- if we could have. We would have said, okay, we will just let this go until after the election. We'll deal with it at that time. So we know that it's there. But, I'm -- I'm trying to get an answer, or get a good feeling as far as the obstruction -- obstructing and not cooperating. I would like to -- to know with all that was happening since the time it went public, and since -- what -- what day did it go public? Number 1679 MS. MACNEILLE: The formal charges were issued September 24th, because that's the ... REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAMS: That was the day it went public. MS. BARNETT: Actually, just a correction. It -- the copy was sent to Lester Syren and Representative Sanders, and -- and then I believe it was the next day that -- that if someone asked what the charges were. I may be incorrect, but there was a gap in between. Possibly the same day, but not the same moment. REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAMS: Okay. I'm still on this 'if game', and I'm trying to understand what was happening, and everything that had happened since September 24th through election -- or through what, October -- October 20th, or thereabouts. Was that the 24th, or -- where the judge ruled and the committee said, okay, we'll just wait till November 14th, or whatever day that was. MS. MACNEILLE: Well, okay. Well, let -- if I can address that. The committee said, November 14th. On ... REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAMS: October 10th. MS. MACNEILLE: ... October 10th, okay. There was no judge in this picture at all until November 22nd ... MS. BARNETT: October ... MS. MACNEILLE: ... oh, October 22nd. We were always going to have the hearing after the election. We never said we wanted to have the hearing before the election. And -- and, you know, there's -- that's -- there are documents to -- to back that up. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Further questions? REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAMS: Not right now. Number 1770 CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Nicholia. REPRESENTATIVE NICHOLIA: Thank you, Chair. First I'd like to thank you for your hard work. I'm just sitting here for the past two days. I can't understand and -- and get a clear picture what a difficult task that the three of you have. And the first question I would like to ask, through the Chair, we've been talking about partisan politics here and it's been said that -- that this is a partisan committee aimed at protecting its own. And I don't know if you can answer this or not but, I'd like to know what is the political makeup of the committee, and what was the political makeup of the committee on November 14th and 15th? MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. I'd be happy to answer that. We have five public members. I and Edith Vorderstrasse, from Barrow, are registered democrats. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: I didn't remember who ... MS. MACNEILLE: Mr. Joe Donohue, from Soldotna, I guess, is where he's from, is a 'U' or an 'O', or a -- you know, something. Neither of -- neither republican or democrat. And Shirley McCoy, from Juneau, and Ed Granger, from Anchorage are the registered republicans. And then our legislative participant, Cynthia Toohey, is republican. REPRESENTATIVE NICHOLIA: If I might ask questions, Mr. Chair? CHAIRMAN KOTT: Please. REPRESENTATIVE NICHOLIA: Another argument that Representative Sanders had yesterday was that the person who filed the complaint did not show up to testify. Is he required to testify, or can he just file the complaint? MS. MACNEILLE: He is not required to testify, and the committee as -- you know, our side of it, had no particular control about whether he did or didn't testify. The presentation of the case -- the decision was made by Mr. Spaan. The way that -- that complaints work, in my experience on the varies committees, seeing a lot of complaints, is that lots of times the person who files the complaint may or may not have personal knowledge about what's going on. And they may or may not be at all useful to the committee in making the final decision about what the -- whether there's a violation or not. And in this instance, the committee didn't feel there was any particular hole in the evidence because the person who filed the complaint didn't testify. MS. BARNETT: And he was not under subpoena. REPRESENTATIVE NICHOLIA: This is a question, through the Chair, to Margie MacNeille. Did Representative Sanders ever approach you before your confirmation to the Ethics Committee to discuss what he -- what he perceived as a conflict of interest? MS. MACNEILLE: No, I ... REPRESENTATIVE NICHOLIA: So, when did this occur? When did this start -- start occurring? MS. MACNEILLE: As far as I know ... REPRESENTATIVE NICHOLIA: Or let me rephrase that. Are -- when did it -- or when did it appear to you that he had this -- this charge against him? MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. First, I'd -- as far as I know, Representative Sanders and I spoke on the phone once about the first violation, and other than that we -- we haven't ever talked. But, as far as I know, the first time I heard, specifically, this concern about my husband's contract was in a letter to -- to Mike White, and so that must have been in -- in October. If there's been other times [indisc.] I don't know. I think that Representative Sanders talked about the committee, and maybe about me, in particular, during the campaign season, and when that was I don't know. And I didn't see it, so. And I don't know if he raised that issue then or not. REPRESENTATIVE NICHOLIA: Okay, thank you. Number 1962 CHAIRMAN KOTT: Margie, since everybody's on the 'what if' end here ... MS. MACNEILLE: In the perfect world, yeah ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: ... in the perfect world. What if the legislature, in some previous year, would have passed some kind of resolution, statute, something of that nature, or citation, if you will, honoring or establishing the existence of a straw poll in Alaska, would that have made any difference in sending this letter now, to a constituent who participates -- who participated in a recognized straw poll? MS. MACNEILLE: I don't know. You know, it certainly would have been something for us to look at, but -- but I don't know. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Okay, so it's still a 'what if'. Representative Vezey. Number 2001 REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have just, I think, three questions and you started to answer it a minute ago, but I'm confused on why the Ethics Commission did a press release. Do you consider that an appropriate part of the process, or -- or, I don't understand that. MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. Are you talking about the press release in this case, or ... REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: In this case. MS. MACNEILLE: What happens is, we do something and -- Susie can talk about it for me -- her but, my phone machine goes bezerk. We've got 12 million people, I got people calling, I got people saying, oh please -- you know, and -- and it seemed to us that the way to deal with that is here's something, you know, and there it is. Here's a press release and -- and ... MS. BARNETT: Well, it wasn't actually a release, it was only the decision. MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. And -- but, yeah, we had conference [indisc.]. MS. BARNETT: Right. MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. Press conference. MS. BARNETT: I mean, there was time for that, but there was no additional spin on -- on the story. It was -- the public decision was issued and Margie and Cynthia were available to answer questions about it. And -- and it is true that it ends up being an all day event, otherwise, of the non-stop. Number 2061 REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: And this is probably just your opinion, I realize, but in your opinion, were there any criminal issues involved in this investigation or complaint? MS. MACNEILLE: In my personal view, which is the only thing, I guess, I can talk about, I didn't feel that was what we were talking about [indisc.]. REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: And I'm not exactly clear, I could -- probably because I haven't read the law enough times but, you know, I have read it. But when does the process leave the area of confidentiality and become a public process? MS. MACNEILLE: Looking at Susie's chart, which you can't see anymore, their are a couple of times there's certain kinds of dismissals that are public, but in this -- in the path that this followed it became public at the formal charge stage. REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: At the formal charge stage, okay. MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: Mr. Chairman, I don't have anymore questions, but I do have some comments, or I could save them for later if -- if you wish. CHAIRMAN KOTT: If you have some comments related to the questions, please continue. REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: First, I would like to comment that I think that, you know, you used good reasoning and good logic in coming up with your interpretation of a definition of governmental versus non-governmental purpose. However, I don't agree with your finding. And the reason being is prior to the straw poll, that we're talking about here being held, I don't think that I viewed that as something of a political or partisan, or campaign value. I viewed it as an economic activity for the ... TAPE 97-4, SIDE B Number 000 REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY (continued): ... and I viewed it as an opportunity to bring state of Alaska issues to the National arena. I don't remember the figures, but it -- it was reported that the straw poll brought over half a million dollars of outside money into the state of Alaska during a very, very slow time of the year, and it was an economic boom to certain parts of our economy and certain areas of the state. And I look upon it strictly in -- in that regard. I -- I don't see any non-governmental purpose and a campaign issue involved there. The straw poll was simply was a chance to market Alaska and to bring convention money into the state of Alaska. That happened to be the way I look at it. Let's see, I had one other comment I'd like to make if I can remember what it was. The -- and I do -- if I understand it correctly, the crux of the issue here is, was state resources used to -- for a non-governmental purpose -- to send out a letter for a non- governmental purpose. Okay, so that -- that is the main thing we're talking about. And I think we've beat to death the -- the fact about the personal office allowance. I think we beat that one down. If I have another comment -- I can't remember what it was, but that is, I think, something that was apparent to me right on is from far before the time we actually had the straw poll, I viewed as more of an economic and marketing activity than I did political. And afterwards it became apparent that it was a tremendous success. And -- and ... MS. MACNEILLE: It just sticks out. It's a political event. It's a tourist activity. I mean ... REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: I'm sorry, I couldn't hear. MS. MACNEILLE: It's an interesting thought of a political event as tourist activity. REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: Well, ... MS. MACNEILLE: I mean, I -- I see your point. It's just ... REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: ... conventions are very, very big business, and on a national scale cities spend a lot of government money trying to market two political parties to get them to hold their conventions in their city. It is a legitimate government activity. I only regret that we didn't recognize the potential that we had there, and to spend more money on marketing 'cause we -- we could have made it a bigger industry. MS. MACNEILLE: Well, there's next time [indisc.]. REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Porter. Number 96 REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: I had one other question I think goes to the merits, I guess. Would you think that -- should I infer from - - from this decision that you would find -- or that generally the -- the committee would find it improper for a legislator to write anything to a group of constituents that were categorized by their party? MS. MACNEILLE: No. REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: Why is this different? MS. MACNEILLE: Because what's in the letter. If you choose to write to a particular group of people, that's -- you know, republicans or democrat, you know, some particularly partisan identified, I think, about some particular issue of -- Bill such and such, that's fine. Number 43 REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: The topic then -- the only people that could participate in the poll were republicans, so that's the only people that he could have written to. But it was more about [indisc.--coughing] topic of the letter and the fact that it was to his party. The topic being thanking them for participating in a partisan, politic process. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Vezey. REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: Sorry, Mr. Chairman. I remember my other comment was just that in the straw poll, to participate, you had to be republican for a minute or two. You could change your registration right there as you got your ballot to vote in the straw poll, and you could walk out the door and change it back to anything else right after you've left. So, it -- I don't know how many people did that. I -- I do know that a lot of people did register at the straw polls, and I -- I saw the numbers. It was a very high number. But to say that just because they registered for a period of time at the straw poll that they were republicans is, I don't think, a terribly accurate statement. Number 197 MS. MACNEILLE: You know -- there -- all we could deal with is the testimony we had before us ... REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: I -- I understand ... MS. MACNEILLE: ... they were republicans and how long, how sincerely they were republicans I don't know, don't want to know. I just .... CHAIRMAN KOTT: Since Representative Vezey did bring up an issue dealing with state funds, I want to ask you, just in general terms, do you distinguish between office allowance accounts, that is, one that is accountable that is held by legislative affairs agency, versus one that you receive in lump sum, and is there some differentiation between the kinds of things you can spend you money on, basically, is what I'm asking? MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah. As I understand it, the $6,000, you have your choice. You can say, take the taxes out of it and -- and hand it over. And once that's done, the Ethics Committee has absolutely nothing to do with what you do with that money. You know, it is yours, and have at it. If the -- if it is kept with the state and -- and issued on an approved, you know, this is a business expense of -- of me as a legislator, then in our view, that's -- that's state money and it's being vouchered out for -- for public purposes and -- and not for personal purposes, or political purposes. You know, political party purposes. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Are you using some area in the statute, or regulation, or is it just policy in regards to let's say keeping your $6,000 with the Legislative Affairs Agency in purchasing items that could, or could not be associated with an office? Do you make that distinguishing difference when you look at these kinds of things? Or does it have to be when you expend this money directly affiliated with your office? And could I -- I guess what I -- what I'm saying, could I take by $6,000 and buy a used car? MS. MACNEILLE: If you -- if -- if you took your $6,000 and paid taxes on it, you could buy a used -- you're not going to buy a new car for that, that's for sure. You're going to buy a ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: Not this day and age. MS. MACNEILLE: ... used car, a rust bucket. But -- but if you left it with ... MS. BARNETT: LAA ... MS. MACNEILLE: ... LAA, I'm sorry, I'm really bad about who these people are, and handed them a voucher and said, you know, buying a used car, and I suppose if you had a reason that that used car was, you know, important to your legislative function, you know, that's -- that's fine. But if you're buying a used car for your, you know, teenager to drive to his job on, that's not okay. Am I answering your question? CHAIRMAN KOTT: Yeah, you're -- you're getting there. MS. MACNEILLE: I'm sorry. CHAIRMAN KOTT: You're getting there. MS. MACNEILLE: I wish this stuff were easy, it's -- I can't make it that way. Number 365 CHAIRMAN KOTT: I mean, there's, I think a lot of concern among many of my colleagues regarding leaving your money now in this office allowance account with LAA is unfortunate because now we've got to pay the tax man, you know, $1,500 or whatever it is, and we don't have the amount remaining that we would like to have to provide the constituency service that, I think our constituents have become -- become used to. So, you know, it's -- it's a real concern, and when we start delving into this issue I think we need to look extremely close at -- at the areas involved that determine what you can use your $6,000 for, versus what you can't use it for. And I, you know, I suppose that anything you purchase you could probably, with some stretch of your imagination, justify it as an office expense if that's what we are, in fact, talking about. Something that is associated with the office, whether it's a TV or a stereo, or a rug or whatever the case might be. But, I mean, certainly, interchangeably, you could use it as a personal item as well. MS. BARNETT: And -- and I think that your -- your first check is - - is with the IRS and -- and with guidelines that LAA is putting forward, and perhaps they have by now. But what are legitimate offices expenses, what -- what expenses allow you to not pay tax? And -- and that's your first check there. And then the second would be, is this for -- purely for my personal benefit. I mean, if those are going to obvious then -- then you can run your own test. And then again, I think that a TV is a great example of something that can be purchased out of an office allowance if it's sitting in the office to sit and watch Gavel to Gavel. There -- there's no question that's -- I think 99 percent of the -- of the questions that legislators have that they'll be able to answer between the IRS, LAA and yourselves. And if there's a fuzzy area, give us a call. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Thank you. Representative -- Speaker Phillips. Number 485 REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Earlier you stated that a person does not have -- a person filing an ethics complaint against the legislature does not have to file that ethics complaint in person, nor do they have to have personal knowledge of the complaint in order to be able to file a complaint. After dealing with the law, as it is on the books today, for several years, would you recommend a change in the law that says if you are going to file a complaint -- an ethics complaint, number one; you must have personal knowledge, you must know what you're doing personally, you must have a personal reason for filing this complaint and if you're serious about filing a complaint, you shall file it in person with the Ethics Committee. MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. I'm sorry if I was misunderstood about the question of filing in person. People do file in person. They, you know, they sign it, it's notarized. Sometimes it comes in the mail, sometimes it comes under Susie's door. REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: But no, I mean -- I mean ... MS. MACNEILLE: ... sometimes it comes in person, but ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: ... and, I understand that ... MS. MACNEILLE: Yes ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: ... I mean, that's the way most people will file it. But when it comes to the -- the actual complaint process that they should have to come before the Ethics Committee in person to make their -- to make their case. Number 551 MS. MACNEILLE: I have a couple of thoughts about that. The first one is that I think the Ethics Committee function is as a safety valve. It's a way -- a method to allow the people in the public who are concerned about things they understand, or hear about legislatures, to know that that gets addressed. That they can raise it in some fashion. And because there is -- you know, we do serve that function, I think we need to be careful about narrowing too carefully, who -- who gets to file complaints. I also think that -- [indisc.] daggers down my back here -- that when you have a legislature that is in one place, in Juneau, and a lot of people are elsewhere and the only information they have about the legislature is media, Gavel to Gavel, things like that, that if you say a complainant can't -- you know, have a complainant attach a newspaper clipping, that there'll be sometimes that legitimate complaints don't ever get to the committee. And I -- there certainly have been complaints filed with our committee that went all the way, that came out of stuff people read the newspaper and complained to us about. And maybe the newspaper accounts turned out not to be accurate from our view point, but there -- there was -- there was a germ of something there and -- and we went on with it. It is exceedingly uncomfortable for legislators to be subject to this kind of thing. And it is exceedingly uncomfortable because it's the legislators in power who get the complaints. You know, people don't much file complaints against anybody in the minority, whoever the minority is. But I think it is one way of -- of allowing that public concern to come up. If you want to change it, that's -- that's okay, but that's just my view. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Elton. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Thanks, Mr. Chair. Kind of a follow-up to Speaker Phillip's question. Any complaint that you accept has to be given under oath? MS. MACNEILLE: Notarized, yeah. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: Well, could you explain to me what notarization means. I -- I mean, I -- I -- I used the word oath in -- kind of on purpose, and ... MS. MACNEILLE: Okay. And I ducked it. I'll let Susie answer it. MS. BARNETT: Oh, great. No, she gets the complaints. Are you -- you asking what a complaint looks like and what -- what notarized means. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: I -- I guess I'm asking whether or -- I -- I -- whether or not there is a disincentive to file a false complaint. MS. BARNETT: Well, there is a part of the, you know, criminal code that a false accusation brings -- I have to look it up and see what the penalty is. But yes, so there -- there -- there is that part, that -- that certainly if you felt -- if, hypothetically, you received a complaint against you and you felt it was a false accusation, then you can go over to the criminal code and ... MS. MACNEILLE: Class A misdemeanor, yeah. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: And -- and -- and the notarization portion of that is -- is what would trigger ... MS. BARNETT: Right. They are saying that -- that I wrote this. That I believe this. That this is ... REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: And -- and I think the second point, and -- and I always hate restate something -- something that somebody else has asked. But the way I understood the second comment from the Speaker was, could there be a -- a requirement that somebody who has filed a complaint to participate in the process beyond, simply filing the complaint. And I ... REPRESENTATIVE PHILLIPS: That's correct. REPRESENTATIVE ELTON: And -- and is it -- can any party compel the participation of another person so -- so either the person the complaint was filed against, or the [indisc.--mic interference] the committee, itself, can compel the attendance of anybody? MS. MACNEILLE: Yeah, we have -- yeah -- can subpeona them. And I've looked at the complaint form which someone signs -- here's the statement right above the signature: I understand that a person commits the crime of false accusation if the person knowingly, or intentionally, initiates a false complaint with the Select Committee on Legislative Ethics; cites the statute. The above is a true, and accurate representation of my belief that a violation of the legislative ethics law occurred; signature, subscribed and sworn to before me this, blank -- that's the notary. So, that's the answer that you were given. Number 811 CHAIRMAN KOTT: Further questions. Hearing none, seeing no one jump to the fore front, I guess this concludes the questioning and answer period. Again, on behalf of the committee and many members who are probably watching Gavel to Gavel at home, we thank you for being so candid for enlightening us in the process. I think all of us have a good understanding of what you've gone through during the course of this activity related to this particular matter. Again, I -- I thank you for coming down and being available to us. It certainly means a lot to -- to all of us. Anybody else want to make any .... REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: I -- if I may, Mr. Chairman. I would just say thank you very much for coming down and -- and taking the time to help us try to deal with the situation that has gone on too long, nobody's fault, but I think it's gone on too long and really needs to be wrapped up and put to bed. And you have helped that process immensely. And I -- I certainly want you to know from me, and I'm sure from all the other members here, that any implication, no matter how subtle, is incorrect that you're here because we feel that you have done something wrong. We, by statute, are forced to deal with the recommendations that you have given us. And in this particular case, we just didn't have enough information to do that appropriately. And -- and you have helped us immensely towards that end. Our thanks. CHAIRMAN KOTT: There was one final comment, now that I remember. You made a comment that said something to the effect that, "After I say this you're going to be more angry at us." I don't think that's the case. No one is angry at you. MS. MACNEILLE: I -- I understand. I -- I ... CHAIRMAN KOTT: I remember, and ... MS. MACNEILLE: Impatience, I guess is the -- we don't -- we don't often get to bring you good news. And ... REPRESENTATIVE PORTER: I can relate to that. [Indisc.-- simultaneous-laughter]. CHAIRMAN KOTT: Okay. REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: Mr. Chair. Number 927 CHAIRMAN KOTT: Representative Vezey. REPRESENTATIVE VEZEY: I would like to comment that we all volunteered for this job. Number 938 CHAIRMAN KOTT: This is true. Thank you very much, again. And this committee will stand in recess until tomorrow at the Call of the Chair. [Chairman Pete Kott recessed the House Rules Committee meeting at 8:52 p.m.]