Four Crestwood residents have asked the Missouri Ethics Commission to determine whether city officials and/or a citizens group acted improperly to inform voters about a tax-rate increase that was defeated in last week’s election.

Crestwood voters convincingly defeated a proposed six-year, 35-cent tax-rate increase on real and personal property in the Aug. 5 election. A total of 2,159 residents — 71.66 percent — voted “no” on Proposition 1 and 854 residents — 28.34 percent — voted “yes,” according to unofficial election results.

Tom Ford told the Call Sunday that he and three other residents filed the query with the Missouri Ethics Commission. He declined to identify the other three residents.

“… I want to know whether there were any violations there and, if so, by whom and why …,” Ford said. “I’m not accusing anyone of anything. I don’t have subpoena powers. I don’t have powers of arrest. I have no power other than to say as your local citizen, I’m not quite sure I understand how this went down. Can you please explain?”

A copy of the query provided to the Call by Ford states, “At issue is the unauthorized use of taxpayer money to promote a series of town-hall meetings sponsored by the Citizens for Proposition 1. The city used its newsletter, Crestwood Connections, and reverse-911 system to advertise and promote these meetings without including a disclaimer that the meetings were sponsored by a registered campaign committee.

“The July/August 2008 city newsletter, Crestwood Connections, contains the following statement on Page One: ‘The Board of Aldermen has set forth the question and will attempt by means of the information in this newsletter and a series of town-hall meetings to provide the citizens with relevant information,”’ the query states.

It continues, “Included on Page Three as well is the following: ‘Please attend the town-hall meetings held in July so that you can obtain all the facts and have your questions answered.’ The implication of the first statement is that the Board of Aldermen sponsored the meetings. In fact, no such decision was ever made by the board nor was the idea of holding Proposition 1 informational meetings ever discussed by the board.

“In the second statement, there is no indication that anyone other than the city is sponsoring the Prop 1 information town-hall ward meetings. Nowhere is there mention of the Citizens for Proposition 1 and/or Crestwood Residents for Prop 1 or their sponsorship of these meetings,” the query states. “In fact, at three of the meetings held, comments were made by residents that they felt ‘duped,’ ‘hoodwinked’ and ‘misled.’

“Residents came to the meetings expecting to receive information on Prop 1, only to discover that this information was being provided by a campaign committee established to promote a ‘yes’ vote on the tax …”

Asked why he wanted to bring this to the attention of the Ethics Commission, Ford said, “… My major reason was once we found out this was not going to be a town-hall meeting, my personal opinion is having elderly people coming out of their house in high heat and humidity, expending gas with the cost of gasoline these days, to arrive at a meeting only to find out it’s not what they expected is not my idea of a proper way to do business.”

Regarding such remarks as “duped,” “hoodwinked” and “misled,” he said, “… Those comments were actually stated in the meetings — three different meetings. They felt hoodwinked, et cetera, et cetera. Those aren’t comments that were pulled out of the air. They’re, in fact, comments made by citizens from Crestwood.”

The query also questions the use of the city’s reverse-911 system to notify residents of the meetings.

“The city used its reverse-911 system to invite residents to the town-hall meetings … The city has used the reverse-911 system in the past for town-hall meetings, but these were meetings that were voted on and sponsored by the city’s Board of Aldermen,” the query states.

Ford said one alderman he spoke with did not learn about the town-hall meeting for his own ward until receiving a reverse-911 call.

“… Alderman Jerry Miguel was not notified about his own ward meeting on Tuesday evening (July 22) until the Saturday before when he received the (reverse) 911 call …,” he said. “There were also people at the meeting — some associated with the Prop 1 committee and some not — who actually got into shouting matches with residents when people asked questions. So it got a little on the ridiculous side and I thought, well, surely they’re not going to continue this. Well, they did four different times and it never changed.”

At that July 22 meeting, some residents questioned the propriety of using public resources to promote meetings presented by a group promoting the tax-rate increase.

“That doesn’t strike me as a town-hall meeting,” former Ward 2 Alderman Tim Trueblood said during the July 22 town-hall meeting. “That’s not the same thing. I question strongly the legality of having that published in the Crestwood Connections at my tax-dollar expense to have a pro anything or a negative anything published on what’s supposed to be a neutral position in a government publication.”

Mayor Roy Robinson told Trueblood that City Attorney Rob Golterman approved of the advertisement in the Crestwood Connections and said “everything is approved by the legal staff before it goes out.”

The residents’ query also states that information contained in the city’s newsletter is the exact same information used by the citizens’ committee during its overhead presentations at the town-hall meetings.

“… Pages Four, Five and Six of the news-letter replicate exactly overheads used in the Citizens for Proposition 1 presentation,” the query states.

Regarding the query sent to the Ethics Commission, Ford said, “I requested the information as to whether this is straight up and legal — reason being their overheads matched the city’s newsletter completely. I mean I have it word for word. I’ve got a copy of it here … I just didn’t come up with this on my own. There’s a lot of corroborating material, a lot of backup material to what I’m saying.”

Asked about the defeat of the tax-rate increase, he said, “I think the older citizens of Crestwood have taken a look at it, as have I, and a bunch of other people — quite obviously, 72 percent — and said we’re not sure we need this when we have $5.5 million in the bank and we’re $1 million ahead of last year on taxes. We may need it in the future. If so, I would — frankly, if we need it in the future, I would vote for it. My arguments — as a matter of fact, I started out by saying I would vote for it, but I want to see controls in place, which were not put into place, and I want it ‘sunsetted’ in less than six years. I don’t believe it’s necessary for six years. That was not done either …”