The state Democratic chairman has asked Pennsylvania's elections bureau to investigate alleged errors in campaign finance reports filed by Republican Chet Beiler since 2003.
T.J. Rooney, the Democrats' head, wrote in an Aug. 14 letter that 11 of 14 reports filed by Beiler, running for state auditor general against incumbent Democrat Jack Wagner, "contained errors, omissions, miscalculations, misclassifications and issues of noncompliance."
Beiler, who said he didn't know about the letter until contacted by the Sunday News last week, said the Democrats were trying to divert public attention from the fraud charges filed earlier this summer against members of the House Democratic Caucus.
"Here Jack is, pointing the finger at us, while four fingers are pointing back at him," Beiler said.
"He has been asleep at the wheel while his colleagues cost the state millions of our taxpayer dollars."
A Department of State press spokeswoman, Leslie Amoros, said the bureau cannot confirm or deny whether an investigation is under way. She said that the step most commonly taken when mistakes are found is to ask the candidate to file corrected reports.
Abe Amoros, a spokesman for the Democrats (and Leslie Amoros' husband), said the party has gotten no response yet from the elections bureau.
Rooney's letter contended that the mistakes are "particularly troubling of a candidate for the position of auditor general."
Wagner, who said he was aware of the letter, agreed: "Errors are errors when it comes to the [state] election code. They're even more concerning when it relates to a candidate who wants to be the chief auditor of Pennsylvania."
'Basic mathematics'?Beiler, who lives in Penn Township, is founder of Amish Country Gazebos and is a former county Republican chairman. He said that since he just learned about the charges, his campaign is looking into the allegations.
Wagner said the party routinely checks candidates' expense reports.
"We had several concerns regarding his campaign finances, and seeing as he's running for auditor general, we thought it was incredibly important to question his finances, given that he's running for a position where he must be accountable to public finance on a daily basis," Abe Amoros said.
Beiler's reports were scrutinized going back to his first campaign for auditor general in 2003. He eventually stepped aside prior to the state GOP endorsement convention in favor of Joe Peters, who lost in 2004 to Wagner.
According to Rooney's letter, problems in 11 of Beiler's 14 reports since then were:
• In 2003, a $10,000 loan from then-state Sen. Chip Brightbill's campaign committee was listed both as a contribution and an unpaid debt, as was part of a $70,000 loan from Beiler.
• In 2005, the starting balance of $41,894.35 did not match the ending balance of the previous report, which was $41,644.16.
• The name of Beiler's committee changed in 2006 from "Chet Beiler for Auditor General" to "Friends of Chet Beiler," although he apparently did not close his first committee and open a new committee.
• Beiler filed two reports for the first period of 2006 without indicating whether one, which included $4,215.23 in expenses while the other did not, was an amended report.
• In 2007, $349.25 in interest was listed as an in-kind contribution on the report's cover page.
• In the first filing period of 2008, the signature of the committee's treasurer was not notarized; in the third cycle, a different treasurer was named, but his printed name and phone number were not provided.
• A new committee created in 2008 for Beiler's current race was signed by the same notary in the first two filing periods, but the signatures did not appear to be the same.
• In the second filing period of 2008, $3,730.08 in loans from Beiler was not listed as an unpaid debt, and the treasurer's phone number wasn't given.
• In the third cycle of 2008, there was a discrepancy of $9,177.04 between the ending balance of the previous report and the starting balance of the new report, and another $30,000 from Beiler was not listed as an unpaid debt.
• Beiler's personal report — candidates file separate reports for their committees and their own finance activities — classified $3,000 in loans as an expenditure rather than an unpaid debt in the second cycle of this year, and in Cycle 3, "Mr. Beiler signed the cover sheet under Part II ('Candidate's Authorized Committee Report') instead of under Part I ('Candidate's Report')."
Rooney's letter to Jessica Myers, chief of the division of campaign finance, argued that the "total error rate of 78.6 percent" since 2003 and "current-year error rate of 87.5 percent is simply unacceptable."
"How can Mr. Beiler serve as an effective watchdog over billions of state tax dollars when he cannot properly account for thousands of his own?"
Wagner, a former state senator from Pittsburgh, characterized the mistakes as "serious accounting errors."
"I'm not aware of all the details," he said, "but I'm aware there are some real questions … that should be of concern to the voters of the commonwealth."
He said he checks information on his reports before he signs them, including whether the starting balance matches the previous report's ending balance.
"That is very basic mathematics," Wagner said.
Beiler, though, said the allegations are an attempt to distract voters from Bonusgate — the investigation into the House Democratic Caucus' use of state employees and resources for political purposes. He said Wagner failed to flag such abuses, "resulting in losses of millions of taxpayer dollars."
"This is a typical move by a career politician to change the focus from his record and his dereliction of duty," Beiler said. "He's a politician with a 25-year record, and he doesn't want us focusing on that."
'Getting it right'Leslie Amoros, the Department of State spokeswoman, said the bureau's policy is to neither confirm nor deny investigations.
Generally, she said, if someone asks the bureau to investigate a filing, the department looks at the reports. If the candidate "simply needs to have reports resubmitted and corrected," that's what the bureau has the candidate do.
If there are "more issues," the case "possibly could be referred to the [state] attorney general's office."
Beiler's most recent report shows he had $65,700 on hand as of May 12. Wagner had $371,860. The next filing deadline for state candidates is Sept. 23.
Most analysts consider Beiler the underdog, given Wagner's incumbency and the fact that Democratic voter turnout usually spikes in a presidential election year. The candidates met for the first time last week on an Allentown television show.
Wagner said he doesn't consider the errors minor ones.
"It's a matter of basic accounting and simply getting it right," he said.
Beiler shot back: "Mr. Wagner and Mr. Rooney should clean their own house before making petty charges about someone else's campaign report."
Helen Colwell Adams is a Sunday News staff writer. E-mail her at hcolwell@lnpnews.com.
