By LINDON DODD
Local Columnist
OTISCO —
“This absolutely was not a one-time lapse of judgment, but was a continuous course of action over many months,” Prosecutor Steve Stewart said. “Those that work for the people in government carry a special trust, and those that violate that trust deserve harsh sanctions.”
— A series of quotes from Clark County Prosecutor Steve Stewart in Evening News stories regarding a woman who stole money from her employer, a Sellersburg utility, and pled guilty to class D felony theft.
The Jeffersonville clerk-treasurer fiasco is a problem for everyone, it seems, except Peggy Wilder, the actual clerk-treasurer.
There is an impeachment process. It involves the city council, attorneys, state representatives and the Indiana legislative body. It is involved. It will take time. It will cost money. It will involve political goodwill and political chaos. It is the right process to pursue.
One person should never be above the law. Incredibly, the only legal requirement for Peggy Wilder is to walk into her office one day for each calendar year.
I know everyone on the council and in the mayor’s office would like this whole thing to just go away. It won’t. I am sure they hate when myself or other local scribes keep writing about it. We will.
Larry Wilder, Peggy Wilder’s ex-husband and sometime city attorney, ran interference and convinced the city council and the mayor that it was a personal credit card Peggy Wilder used for purchases and no crime was committed. However, the State Board of Accounts has documented personal purchases on city credit cards, and Peggy Wilder has been charged with misdemeanor conversion.
From an Evening News article published Jan. 15, 2009 — “I have no reason to believe anything other than what she told me,” Larry Wilder said of Peggy Wilder.
There was a legal divorce decree document between the Wilders that was taken to the Evening News office that showed the debt incurred and paid off in the divorce settlement was only in her name. It wasn’t.
Wilder took a copy of the decree to the Evening News office. Per a Jan. 23, 2009, story, “However, the decree that Larry Wilder had provided the newspaper didn’t match the one on file at the Scott County courthouse, where the divorce was made final. The Scott County papers indicated that $22,000 in debt belonged both to Peggy Wilder and ‘another entity.’”
Larry Wilder has said the copy he gave the newspaper was the one that he had in his files. He said the difference between the two copies were likely the result of an amendment to the divorce decree.
It’s certainly a political nightmare for those in office. On Jan. 15, 2009, Ron Grooms was quoted by the paper, “It was generally assumed by almost all of us that she was using this card,” Grooms said. “The problem was that we could not get access to say positively that was going on.”
That might have been a good time for the council to call for a state audit at that time to be positive.
Last week, Councilman Ron Grooms told me he thinks taxpayers will not be happy to spend thousands of dollars of their money on a problem that will go away next year when the clerk-treasurer’s office is amended and Jeffersonville changes its city class status. A clerk will continue to be elected for records-keeping, but the city will employ a controller to handle finances starting in 2012.
It costs taxpayers more than $60,000 per year over 18 months if nothing is done about Peggy Wilder. Taxpayers won’t be happy, for sure. They won’t be happy if you don’t do anything either.
I would suggest one of Jeffersonville’s prominent and successful attorneys might come forward to pro bono this impeachment case on behalf of the innocent taxpayers. They might.
The city keeps using Larry Wilder for legal services because of his expertise. Nobody doubts his legal competency. Elected officials don’t seem to understand how mad taxpayers are when he was leading the charge to keep this from being made public and to convince everyone there was no misdeeds. There was and they are.
The only people I have heard state that they want nothing done are elected officials. Not one citizen I have talked to wants to just let it ride.
They are already angered that Peggy Wilder will get misdemeanor convictions and no time served — for separate alleged crimes in Indiana and Kentucky. A felony conviction would automatically cause an elected official’s removal from office. Two prosecutors, several lawyers and some legal wrangling took care of that.
This whole scenario shows how the sausage-making aspect of politics plays out in Clark County. It is a revolting process — it is ugly, unfair and the only people who are really hurt are the citizens who only expect honest representation from the people for whom they vote.
In this case, they probably won’t get it. Grooms will introduce some resolutions Monday night. I would anticipate another city council dog-and-pony show this week, where nobody will take the messy lead in doing the right thing and begin the process of impeaching Peggy Wilder.
It has been suggested that some kind of public rally or public demonstration take place. I’m game. That would take citizen courage, personal involvement and getting off the couch and away from the computer screen. There was a time when people would do such things. Now they simply send an angry tweet. Every person in political office knows that.
— Lindon Dodd is an Otisco resident who is a freelance writer and can be reached at lindon.dodd@hotmail.com
