David Doss to pay $1,900 ethics penalty

The former state senate candidate settles a 3-yearold case but contends the campaign filing system “is just not reasonable.”

Former state senate candidate and Rome businessman David Doss will pay $1,925 in penalties to settle a threeyear-old ethics complaint, although he continues to dispute the charges.

The agreement under a consent order canceled a hearing that had been scheduled for Thursday by the Georgia Government Transparency and Campaign Finance Commission.

“After a meeting where it was determined we did properly report the contributions, I felt it was easier to pay the penalty and put this issue to rest,” Doss said. “I do not accept responsibility of wrongdoing because there was none.”

The convoluted saga started during Doss’ failed 2012 bid for the Republican nomination in the District 52 State Senate race, and it dragged on through a period in which the former State Ethics Commission was widely seen as dysfunctional. It ended earlier this month, not long after a new director, Stefan Ritter, took the helm.

The July 19, 2012, charges — filed by political gadfly George Anderson, also of Rome — were not part of the commission’s final complaint. Instead, Doss was notified of other discrepancies in November 2014 and agreed to settle those.

“I was absolutely not guilty of the original complaint,” Doss said.

Anderson contended that Doss’ campaign exceeded single-source limits by accepting contributions from Rome businessman Delos Yancey and two local attorneys who did work for him. While those three together did not constitute a common source, Doss said he did discover a violation during his internal review.

Yancey turned out to be a majority stockholder in two out-of-state companies that had donated to his campaign, and that put Doss over the limit from a common source. He said he returned the overage and notified the ethics commission.

“I never heard another word until I received a certified letter dated Nov. 14, 2014, saying they found three other violations — 808 days after my initial response,” Doss said.

The complaints: He failed to report $33,000 in donations made in the run-up to the July 31, 2012, primary; he was late with his Oct. 25, 2012, filing; and he failed to include cumulative totals when it was finally filed.

Doss provided explanations for all three, and emphasized that the final wording of the consent order notes that he did itemize the contributions — on two-day business reports. The two-day reports are required for all donations of $1,000 or more made between the date of the last regular report and the election date.

However, the total was transferred to his Sept. 30, 2012, regular filing as previously reported contributions when they should have been itemized again as new contributions, per state law.

“I think a reasonable person would think they’d already disclosed that, but a reasonable person would be wrong,” Doss said.

The October filing requirement was confusing, he said, because it appeared that it wasn’t required unless there was a runoff. When he received a second notice, he said he filed it using a one-click option because the fund was unchanged since his previous report. But instead of transferring over the data from September, it zeroed out the report.

“The whole system is just not reasonable,” he said. “Everyone gets it wrong.”

The consent order assesses an $1,800 civil penalty plus a $125 late filing fee.

Between 2011 and 2014, the ethics commission received numerous complaints from local elected officials around the state contending the filing system is too complicated. A check of its website listing late filers Friday shows 44 officials from Rome as having outstanding issues.

Legislation passed in 2013 let local officials return to filing with their elections clerk instead of the state, effective Jan. 1, 2014.

The embattled commission also went through three executive directors between 2011 and 2015, and met only irregularly. Its attorney, Robert Lane, reported during the Dec. 10, 2014, meeting that there were 222 open complaints, some dating back to 2004.

During that same meeting, the then executive director of Common Cause, William Perry, said he was glad to see the board “functioning again” after a long hiatus.