Clerical Error Blamed For Discrepancies

Republican Rep. Helen Chenoweth on Tuesday blamed a clerical error for the latest discrepancies in her campaign finance disclosure statements filed with the state and the Federal Election Commission last week.

“I don’t like those simple clerical errors, but I guess there’s about 14,000 different judgments you make on these FEC reports and we made a mistake there,” Chenoweth told KIDO radio in Boise.

The latest revisions to earlier campaign disclosure statements indicated that a company Chenoweth was a partner in received $4,600 last Dec. 29 from the campaign for work on the 1996 primary when the company had notified the state eight weeks earlier that it was no longer in business.

Chenoweth said the error was in identifying the payments for work in the 1996 primary when they were for earlier debts to Consulting Associates Inc. She said the debts should have been identified as coming in 1995, although the only debts to Consulting Associates cited on the disclosure reports were incurred in 1994.

Chenoweth did not comment on two remaining discrepancies.

One involves how the campaign for a full year could report that it started 1995 owing Consulting Associates $5,849.11 and then suddenly last week reduce that amount to $3,821.11. No declaration was filed to show that additional money was paid to Consulting Associates in 1994 to account for the reduction.

The other discrepancy involves how campaign financial records could initially support reports that showed specific payments on Dec. 29, 1995, to Consulting Associates of $5,349.11 and $541.81 and then be used to back up last week’s revision that changed the specific payments to $4,056, $1293.11 and $541.81.

“I have asked for the entire report,” Chenoweth said. “I have not seen it, but I will examine it. If there are any mistakes at all, or miscalculations, we’ll certainly take care of it.”