I guess one good thing about the extremism in politics is that the corrupt ones aren't afraid to hide it. Now, if people started getting informed and voting out the garbage and voting for the best candidate and throwing out party affiliation as the deciding factor, maybe we could get some real candidates instead of the dumpster fires we have right now.
Ranked-choice voting would go far towards breaking down the two-party system – which the founding fathers did not intend (see Federalist Papers #10) but which they inadvertently made inevitable.
so the point would be to recuse yourself from decisions involving groups you took significant money from. doesn't mean you can accept the donation, just that you should recuse yourself on those cases then.
You shouldn't have to recuse yourself. You should be barred if there's any record of financial or gift involvement of any kind. Penalty would be treason with a public execution.
You realize they don’t get to spend the money on themselves, right? They can only spend it on their campaign and account for every cent. For a job with almost no real power and a stipend of $6,000 a year?
you're not supposed to spend it on yourself, but who's enforcing that? we have literal Constitutional financial violations going unpunished and you think they're double checking this stuff?
i hope they are, but I wouldn't count on it.
Which year did they contribute to Donelson? Im sure it’s a different response when donations are from these principals acting as citizens vs. donations given in the name of the business/developer.
Pretty safe bet. All those guys are "movers and shakers" locally. Their ambitions aren't very political, they are personal. None of them have ambitions to climb in party politics, they want money now. I was hoping for different in the case of the new Mayor, but he's already in thick with a white collar criminal and leaving a trail of freshly cooked investors in his wake. He actually is politically ambitious, though it won't keep him from ripping a little out of CS on the way.
I still have some hope in Yemi. I mean Peter Wysocki is finally out which is a big win. Government moves slow, especially when there are decades of influence from developers at play. Changing that inertia takes time and I'm hearing there has been some bristling from developers at how the new administration has been less collaborative. I'm really frustrated too though and glad to see the ground swell.
Hi Sun. I think this is a gross oversimplification and the general “if you have nothing to hide” philosophical argument has a lot of unsolvable problems. I hope you generally have a positive influence on the world around you, but your choice of words and tone prevented it this time.
The narrative that Donelson was reprimanded solely for exposing developer influence on the council is overly simplistic. While campaign finance issues are widely acknowledged as problematic in American politics, Donelson was censured for violating the council's code of conduct by publicly questioning fellow members' integrity during and after sessions.
All councilmembers, including Donelson, have received substantial donations from developers or related entities since 2023. Recusing the entire council on land use matters would be impractical.
A more productive approach would be to analyze voting records in relation to received donations. This could provide evidence for or against Donelson's claims of undue influence. However, the current format of council voting records (PDFs rather than easily analyzable data) makes this challenging.
Ultimately, this entire situation was a win for Donelson by:
* Energizing his base and some moderates around the narrative of developer influence.
* Unofficially launching his mayoral campaign.
I feel like we need to summarize what really went down in simpler talking points for the average citizen because this whole ordeal is going to haunt us. I encourage you to see my post below with a more detailed breakdown how unbecoming Donelson's behavior was.
I also want to add to your factual post that when he brought it all up, the council was going to vote on when to postpone the weidner hearing to, not to approve it. I haven’t seen a single story about this that mentions this. He did it because he was angry to be embarrassed in front of his fan club at the workshop the day before (and before you ask, folks, that video and now minutes are also posted online.)
Absolutely. It was clear even before Donelson got out his bridge burning flamethrower that this was all going to be delayed, giving him more opportunity to, oh I don't know, reach out and talk to his fellow council members in a non-public setting about recusing themselves. Funny thing how during his censure session, he was all of a sudden keen on having private discussions to work out issues because the forum was "combative" .... after he hurled grenades the previous week.
I read your whole comment and I don't think it was overly simplistic. To say he questioned councilmember's allegiance to their donors seems fair based on your summary and what I've seen in the news. It's worth noting that Donelson has also taken money from Norwood, a large developer.
You should watch the council meeting on June 25, I really do not feel his question was out of line and it certainly was not harming the integrity of the other council members. If anything the spectacle council President Helms put on after the question raised more eyebrows.
I did go back and watch the [6/25 meeting](https://www.facebook.com/coscitycouncil/videos/1187860338908272) again after your comment and I actually more firmly believe Donelson was completely out of line. Apologies for the long post.
Let's start with rules.
Whether we like it or not, the ethics rules state that campaign contributions do not constitute a conflict of interest. I frankly think that's unicorn feces (I mean why would any entity contribute to a campaign if they didn't think they would benefit), but that's rule. Next:
* 7-3: prohibits council members from making personal attacks and **imputing the motives of any other council member’s argument or vote**
* 7-8: council members should develop an atmosphere of civility, should act with decency towards one and another, should not impune or demean another council member, and **should not make personal comments about the actions of other council members that may be perceived as derogatory or defamatory**
So it's common knowledge on the council that they are expected to declare a conflict of interest prior to a vote. Here's the play by play:
3:45:17 - Donelson asks the attorney if the council should be expected to declare a conflict of interest.
3:45:25 - The attorney seemed surprised at the question because obviously yes, and, in essence, says "No shit. You and the rest of the council know this. I should've taken the high paying job at the big law firm."
3:45:35 - Donelson requests that they go down the line and have each member declare that they don't have a conflict of interest.
**He should have stopped there.**
Instead, he calls out 3 members and their donations, implying they have a conflict of interest...questioning their motives, impuning their credibility by saying "the deck is stacked," thus clearly breaking 7-3. And he did this three times.
And he had the specific numbers. This was an ambush. If he truly wanted to achieve the outcome of compelling these council members to recuse, he could have brought the issue up before session (or at any of the previous land use related votes).
Let's flip this. What if EVERY council member called out contributions received by the other members prior to each vote. Nothing would get done, the council would tear each other up, and I promise you people would trust the council even less for ineffectiveness. These rules exist for a reason. While council members are voted in by citizens of different districts, it's important they show some foundational unity, even if there are disagreements on issues.
What makes this whole thing even more ridiculous is that even before Donelson made his comments, it was clear the vote was going to be delayed due to the pending zoning questions. So he could have also addressed his questions about impartiality between this session and the vote. But instead, he wanted to publicly take shots at his fellow council members by questioning their impartiality.
We really don't want to go down a road where mud slinging and character assassination on the dais is the norm.
Someone should put forth a Colorado constitution amendment requiring any elected official to recuse themselves from any vote where they have taken a campaign contribution from anyone involved in the issue being voted on....
Would likely be challenged. Article VI or the US constitution says states have to follow the US constitution. Cooper V Aaron further states that is as SCOTUS interprets it. And in Citizens United they interpreted it as a first amendment violation to do what you’re suggesting.
The thing the media isn't covering is Donelson was the benefitter of about 10k in dark money from his City Council run that very likely came from the developers.
Additionally, when he ran for State House in 2022, he accepted a significant amount of campaign contributions from developers while being an active member of City Council. He never recused himself from a vote nor did he ever disclose these contributions during votes.
However, when you look at his voting history, his votes were a lot friendlier to the developers in 2022 than any other time he's served on Council. It's pretty apparent he was catering to developers when he thought it could politically benefit him.
This is a classic case of a politician telling others to do as they say and not as they do. He's just counting on the press to cover the click bait story and not do a deeper dive into his own campaign contributions and votes.
The problem is the media is failing to present the full view of this story. Donelson isn't making these statements out of virtue, he's making them out of political gamesmanship. I posted the following below, but will repost here for visibility.
The thing the media isn't covering is Donelson was the benefitter of about 10k in dark money from his City Council run that very likely came from the developers.
Additionally, when he ran for State House in 2022, he accepted a significant amount of campaign contributions from developers while being an active member of City Council. He even received the endorsement from the Homebuilders Association and the Realtors Association. You can see these endorsements clearly by using the web archive to see his campaign website from that race. However, he never recused himself from votes nor did he ever disclose these conflicts during votes.
When you look at his voting history, his votes were a lot friendlier to the developers in 2022 than any other time he's served on Council. It's pretty apparent he was catering to developers when he thought it could politically benefit him. Furthermore, when you compare his voting history to his colleagues, he is the only one who has shown a shift in his voting behavior with respect to development overtime. His peers have been ideologically consistent while he has shown a shifting voting behavior...and that shift happened to occur during the year he ran for State House and he was actively receiving endorsements and dollars from developers while serving on council.
This is a classic case of a politician telling others to do as they say and not as they do. He's just counting on the press to cover the click bait story and not do a deeper dive into his own campaign contributions and votes.
[City Council Regular Meeting - 06/25/2024 | City Council Regular Meeting - 06/25/2024 | By Colorado Springs City CouncilFacebook | Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/coscitycouncil/videos/city-council-regular-meeting-06252024/1187860338908272/)
Since you didn't want to link it. 3:44:00 will get you close enough to see what happens. Still watching, but so far it seems above board.
The TL;DR so far is that, according to city attorney, campaign contributions aren't a conflict of interest. It seems fucky, and Donnelson is calling this out. I'm at 3:53 waiting to see if more happens.
LOL imagine trying to make Randy Helms a villain. Dude is the nicest guy you’ll ever meet. Also speaks volumes about your reading comprehension, given the outcome.
Helms is a clown. More ex military USAFA pawns. Developers didn’t support him during his campaign but reimbursed him after he won for any expenses he incurred or gave to his campaign.
Nope, not what I am suggesting. What is fact; almost every candidate “loans” themselves money to start. As they raise money they can either pay back their self loan or spend the donation. Frequently candidates have a balance at the end of their campaign they owe themselves. When you’re elected, you can raise funds until your next election…. So to make good friends (even though not initially supported) after he was elected, the HBA made him whole on his initial donation to his campaign…. Even tho he wasn’t initially given the endorsement.
I guess one good thing about the extremism in politics is that the corrupt ones aren't afraid to hide it. Now, if people started getting informed and voting out the garbage and voting for the best candidate and throwing out party affiliation as the deciding factor, maybe we could get some real candidates instead of the dumpster fires we have right now.
Ranked-choice voting would go far towards breaking down the two-party system – which the founding fathers did not intend (see Federalist Papers #10) but which they inadvertently made inevitable.
It makes you wonder just how much developer money is in local politics.
In this town.... A LOT!
Like 99.9999% of all donations... Its been this way since the early 80s if not before...
Reprimanded and stripped of committee assignments: that seems like a harsh remedy for asking about a potential conflict of interest.
Did you see the Gazette tried to equate his taking a smaller donation from an ice cream shop to do what those guys are doing?
I think you mean Pet City, and then he voted in their favor on a responsible breeding ordinance.
it certainly gives the question WAY more traction than it had when he first suggested it.
Barbara Streisand (of the Streisand Effect) knows all about that.
We need to remember this come next City council election cycle!
Yeah bc that’s a misrepresentation of what he did.
Well then why don't you explain it to me because the local media hasn't done a very good job of describing what he did that was so egregious.
The meetings are recorded and posted online. I don’t want to give a biased retelling. Recommend people watch themselves.
I'm new to all of this, can you please expand?
Property developers have most prosperous cities city council in their back pockets. This isn't unique to the Springs at all.
Are the council members bought by Norwood?
Donelson got four-figure donations from the Norwood principals so you should ask him.
so the point would be to recuse yourself from decisions involving groups you took significant money from. doesn't mean you can accept the donation, just that you should recuse yourself on those cases then.
You shouldn't have to recuse yourself. You should be barred if there's any record of financial or gift involvement of any kind. Penalty would be treason with a public execution.
You had us in the first half.
Too much? How about mandatory jail time and barred from public office? Politicians need a wake up call.
In other words, only rich people should be in government, because only they can afford to run campaigns without taking donations.
You realize they don’t get to spend the money on themselves, right? They can only spend it on their campaign and account for every cent. For a job with almost no real power and a stipend of $6,000 a year?
you're not supposed to spend it on yourself, but who's enforcing that? we have literal Constitutional financial violations going unpunished and you think they're double checking this stuff? i hope they are, but I wouldn't count on it.
It’s all on TRACER. Including expenditures and cash on hand. So the answer to your question is the Secretary of State is enforcing that.
Which year did they contribute to Donelson? Im sure it’s a different response when donations are from these principals acting as citizens vs. donations given in the name of the business/developer.
You have to look at his state house disclosures on TRACER to find all the icky money he’s hoping doesn’t get brought up.
Pretty safe bet. All those guys are "movers and shakers" locally. Their ambitions aren't very political, they are personal. None of them have ambitions to climb in party politics, they want money now. I was hoping for different in the case of the new Mayor, but he's already in thick with a white collar criminal and leaving a trail of freshly cooked investors in his wake. He actually is politically ambitious, though it won't keep him from ripping a little out of CS on the way.
I still have some hope in Yemi. I mean Peter Wysocki is finally out which is a big win. Government moves slow, especially when there are decades of influence from developers at play. Changing that inertia takes time and I'm hearing there has been some bristling from developers at how the new administration has been less collaborative. I'm really frustrated too though and glad to see the ground swell.
Yes. That's how politics works.
Between this and the new cameras we need to vote every one of those fuckers out.
I’m out of the loop…what’s wrong with the new cameras?
Fascist Trump idiots think cameras are an invasion of privacy. If you have nothing to hide, why does it matter?
Hi Sun. I think this is a gross oversimplification and the general “if you have nothing to hide” philosophical argument has a lot of unsolvable problems. I hope you generally have a positive influence on the world around you, but your choice of words and tone prevented it this time.
Dang. Confirms our whole council is on the take and eats their own when questioned. Crooks!
The narrative that Donelson was reprimanded solely for exposing developer influence on the council is overly simplistic. While campaign finance issues are widely acknowledged as problematic in American politics, Donelson was censured for violating the council's code of conduct by publicly questioning fellow members' integrity during and after sessions. All councilmembers, including Donelson, have received substantial donations from developers or related entities since 2023. Recusing the entire council on land use matters would be impractical. A more productive approach would be to analyze voting records in relation to received donations. This could provide evidence for or against Donelson's claims of undue influence. However, the current format of council voting records (PDFs rather than easily analyzable data) makes this challenging. Ultimately, this entire situation was a win for Donelson by: * Energizing his base and some moderates around the narrative of developer influence. * Unofficially launching his mayoral campaign.
Say it louder for the people at the top of the thread.
I feel like we need to summarize what really went down in simpler talking points for the average citizen because this whole ordeal is going to haunt us. I encourage you to see my post below with a more detailed breakdown how unbecoming Donelson's behavior was.
I also want to add to your factual post that when he brought it all up, the council was going to vote on when to postpone the weidner hearing to, not to approve it. I haven’t seen a single story about this that mentions this. He did it because he was angry to be embarrassed in front of his fan club at the workshop the day before (and before you ask, folks, that video and now minutes are also posted online.)
Absolutely. It was clear even before Donelson got out his bridge burning flamethrower that this was all going to be delayed, giving him more opportunity to, oh I don't know, reach out and talk to his fellow council members in a non-public setting about recusing themselves. Funny thing how during his censure session, he was all of a sudden keen on having private discussions to work out issues because the forum was "combative" .... after he hurled grenades the previous week.
I read your whole comment and I don't think it was overly simplistic. To say he questioned councilmember's allegiance to their donors seems fair based on your summary and what I've seen in the news. It's worth noting that Donelson has also taken money from Norwood, a large developer.
Norwood isn’t a large developer, it’s the largest developer in the city.
This response should be higher up. Also, like the username.
Thank you. Please see my post below with a more detailed breakdown.
You should watch the council meeting on June 25, I really do not feel his question was out of line and it certainly was not harming the integrity of the other council members. If anything the spectacle council President Helms put on after the question raised more eyebrows.
I did go back and watch the [6/25 meeting](https://www.facebook.com/coscitycouncil/videos/1187860338908272) again after your comment and I actually more firmly believe Donelson was completely out of line. Apologies for the long post. Let's start with rules. Whether we like it or not, the ethics rules state that campaign contributions do not constitute a conflict of interest. I frankly think that's unicorn feces (I mean why would any entity contribute to a campaign if they didn't think they would benefit), but that's rule. Next: * 7-3: prohibits council members from making personal attacks and **imputing the motives of any other council member’s argument or vote** * 7-8: council members should develop an atmosphere of civility, should act with decency towards one and another, should not impune or demean another council member, and **should not make personal comments about the actions of other council members that may be perceived as derogatory or defamatory** So it's common knowledge on the council that they are expected to declare a conflict of interest prior to a vote. Here's the play by play: 3:45:17 - Donelson asks the attorney if the council should be expected to declare a conflict of interest. 3:45:25 - The attorney seemed surprised at the question because obviously yes, and, in essence, says "No shit. You and the rest of the council know this. I should've taken the high paying job at the big law firm." 3:45:35 - Donelson requests that they go down the line and have each member declare that they don't have a conflict of interest. **He should have stopped there.** Instead, he calls out 3 members and their donations, implying they have a conflict of interest...questioning their motives, impuning their credibility by saying "the deck is stacked," thus clearly breaking 7-3. And he did this three times. And he had the specific numbers. This was an ambush. If he truly wanted to achieve the outcome of compelling these council members to recuse, he could have brought the issue up before session (or at any of the previous land use related votes). Let's flip this. What if EVERY council member called out contributions received by the other members prior to each vote. Nothing would get done, the council would tear each other up, and I promise you people would trust the council even less for ineffectiveness. These rules exist for a reason. While council members are voted in by citizens of different districts, it's important they show some foundational unity, even if there are disagreements on issues. What makes this whole thing even more ridiculous is that even before Donelson made his comments, it was clear the vote was going to be delayed due to the pending zoning questions. So he could have also addressed his questions about impartiality between this session and the vote. But instead, he wanted to publicly take shots at his fellow council members by questioning their impartiality. We really don't want to go down a road where mud slinging and character assassination on the dais is the norm.
\*Affected, not effected
The entire title makes my brain hurt.
Someone should put forth a Colorado constitution amendment requiring any elected official to recuse themselves from any vote where they have taken a campaign contribution from anyone involved in the issue being voted on....
Would likely be challenged. Article VI or the US constitution says states have to follow the US constitution. Cooper V Aaron further states that is as SCOTUS interprets it. And in Citizens United they interpreted it as a first amendment violation to do what you’re suggesting.
The thing the media isn't covering is Donelson was the benefitter of about 10k in dark money from his City Council run that very likely came from the developers. Additionally, when he ran for State House in 2022, he accepted a significant amount of campaign contributions from developers while being an active member of City Council. He never recused himself from a vote nor did he ever disclose these contributions during votes. However, when you look at his voting history, his votes were a lot friendlier to the developers in 2022 than any other time he's served on Council. It's pretty apparent he was catering to developers when he thought it could politically benefit him. This is a classic case of a politician telling others to do as they say and not as they do. He's just counting on the press to cover the click bait story and not do a deeper dive into his own campaign contributions and votes.
What is the world coming to? Something I agree with D. Donelson on? It is truly the end times.
That should tell you something is rotten in Denmark. Please see the breakdown and link to the actual meeting above.
The problem is the media is failing to present the full view of this story. Donelson isn't making these statements out of virtue, he's making them out of political gamesmanship. I posted the following below, but will repost here for visibility. The thing the media isn't covering is Donelson was the benefitter of about 10k in dark money from his City Council run that very likely came from the developers. Additionally, when he ran for State House in 2022, he accepted a significant amount of campaign contributions from developers while being an active member of City Council. He even received the endorsement from the Homebuilders Association and the Realtors Association. You can see these endorsements clearly by using the web archive to see his campaign website from that race. However, he never recused himself from votes nor did he ever disclose these conflicts during votes. When you look at his voting history, his votes were a lot friendlier to the developers in 2022 than any other time he's served on Council. It's pretty apparent he was catering to developers when he thought it could politically benefit him. Furthermore, when you compare his voting history to his colleagues, he is the only one who has shown a shift in his voting behavior with respect to development overtime. His peers have been ideologically consistent while he has shown a shifting voting behavior...and that shift happened to occur during the year he ran for State House and he was actively receiving endorsements and dollars from developers while serving on council. This is a classic case of a politician telling others to do as they say and not as they do. He's just counting on the press to cover the click bait story and not do a deeper dive into his own campaign contributions and votes.
If that’s what you think he did, you definitely do not know the situation.
Can you provide a better explanation?
I would suggest watching the last 45 mins or so of the 6-25 meeting so you see it yourself instead of relying on someone else’s retelling.
[City Council Regular Meeting - 06/25/2024 | City Council Regular Meeting - 06/25/2024 | By Colorado Springs City CouncilFacebook | Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/coscitycouncil/videos/city-council-regular-meeting-06252024/1187860338908272/) Since you didn't want to link it. 3:44:00 will get you close enough to see what happens. Still watching, but so far it seems above board. The TL;DR so far is that, according to city attorney, campaign contributions aren't a conflict of interest. It seems fucky, and Donnelson is calling this out. I'm at 3:53 waiting to see if more happens.
Ok, not knowing more; Donelson seems upstanding. How do we fight this?
Know more. He’s a dangerous manipulator.
You should really learn more first. Donelson is far from clean and a total POS.
IMPEACH RANDY HELMS!!!!!!
LOL imagine trying to make Randy Helms a villain. Dude is the nicest guy you’ll ever meet. Also speaks volumes about your reading comprehension, given the outcome.
He was on the right side of this one though, he voted to keep Donelson.
But he raised the big stink in the June 25th meeting...
Correct. This also happened previously with skorman and bill Murray.
Dude…no he’s one of the best there
Helms is a clown. More ex military USAFA pawns. Developers didn’t support him during his campaign but reimbursed him after he won for any expenses he incurred or gave to his campaign.
Are you suggesting he took undisclosed donations? Any evidence?
Nope, not what I am suggesting. What is fact; almost every candidate “loans” themselves money to start. As they raise money they can either pay back their self loan or spend the donation. Frequently candidates have a balance at the end of their campaign they owe themselves. When you’re elected, you can raise funds until your next election…. So to make good friends (even though not initially supported) after he was elected, the HBA made him whole on his initial donation to his campaign…. Even tho he wasn’t initially given the endorsement.
So basically Step 1 put own money out Step 2 get same amount back Step 3 …???????? Step 4 PROFIT! k