Kuff has turned into an ethics watchdog and found something amiss in Pam Holm's 8-day out report, which is kind of ironic since her TV ad claims she's going to be the watchdog at City Hall in the controller's office. She's even got a barking dog in her commercial to make the point. You can watch that ad here.
It's this ad that is going to cause an ethics complaint to be filed against her. She's clearly running this ad. I asked my friends for confirmation - "have you seen an actual Pam Holm commercial on TV?" Oh, yeah, lots of responses - yes, we've seen it on CNN, etc.
So, where is the buy in her 8-day out report? It's not there. It's just not. There should be an expenditure for well over $100,000, with something like "ad buy" as the explanation, and it's just not there. It's not in her 30-day out report, either.
How can we trust someone who can't - or won't - be accurate, transparent and ethical in her campaign account reporting to be accurate, transparent and ethical with the City's accounting?
I'm not buying that Pam Holm has the experience or the skill set to be Houston's controller. She wants to be the City's watchdog, yet she's got ethics watchdogs barking at her and biting her where it hurts.
UPDATE: I have a copy of Holm's Comcast ad buy - which is NOT on her 8-day out reports:
UPDATE 2: Pam Holm's campaign manager, Bethel Nathan, left an unpleasant comment which I did not publish. The gist of it was "how ridiculous are you for assuming we spent $100,000 on the ad buy when we only spent $25,000!" Uh, Bethel. I think this speaks volumes about Holm's ability to budget efficiently. I was actually giving you the benefit of the doubt that your fundraising had been lousy. I would have assumed a much larger buy, but I lowballed it. Instead, we learn you spent $10,000 on ad production and $25,000 to put it on the air? The next time I do campaign training, I'll whip this out as a "what not to do" example. Bethel assures me they've done a do over - after we caught the controller candidate incorrectly filling out her campaign finance report. I wonder if they left anything else off that we haven't spotted?
2 comments:
Really is amusing how Ms. Holm campaigns that she will make the Controller's office more transparent, when she can't even make her campaign transparent, of which she is legally obligated to do. She clearly has been too caught up in all the negative campaigning and probably forgot about the puff ad she had put up. It’s also interesting how she is trying to hide her lack of qualifications to run a finance department by slinging mud at her well qualified opponents in hopes to fool voters. Shames on you Ms. Holm for thinking voters are that gullible.
Great post. We need folks like you who have eyes for this kind of thing. Thank you (and Kuff) for doing us all a service.
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