In the last days before the Evanston City Council elections, questions of voting impropriety and conflicting interests remain a point of contention in the First Ward.
Candidate Allan Drebin, a professor in the Kellogg Graduate School of Management, has spent much of his campaign answering questions concerning the possible conflicts of interest he would face if elected to the Evanston City Council.
But now Drebin is raising those same questions about his opponent, incumbent Ald. Arthur Newman.
At a Feb. 5 meeting of the City Council, Newman voted against a proposed food and beverage tax that was lobbied against by several Evanston restaurants.
A campaign disclosure report Newman filed with the county clerk shows that two weeks prior, he received an $819 campaign contribution from The Clean Plate Club, a company which owns Davis Street Fishmarket, Merle’s Smokehouse, Pete Miller’s Steakhouse and Nevin’s Pub.
Newman said the accusation that this represented a conflict of interest was “absolutely false.”
But Drebin cited a decision made by the city’s Corporation Counsel concerning the Evanston Ethics Ordinance, which prohibits “(an appointee) from acting in the manner which gives the appearance of impropriety,” the same precedent Newman himself cited against Drebin earlier in the week.
“(Drebin) is just throwing out accusations,” Newman said. “He has run nothing but a negative and nasty campaign.”
Newman defended his voting record on issues related to campaign contributors. He said he was against a recent extension for an existing liquor license at Davis Street Fishmarket. Newman also said he returned a campaign contribution to the Evanston Athletic Club because of a pending zoning variation.
Also, donations to his campaign fail to constitute a “pecuniary interest” as described in the Corporation Counsel’s decision, Newman said.
“It’s not like drawing a salary from somebody,” Newman said. The counsel’s decision referred to Ald. Joe Kent (5th), who is prohibited from voting on matters relating to his employer, Evanston/Skokie District 65. Newman has said that Kent’s situation parallels Drebin’s.
“The cases are exactly the same,” Newman said.
But Drebin said Kent’s case does not relate to him and that his salary from NU is not an interest prohibited by ethics ordinance.
If he were an administrator or a trustee, Drebin said, his salary could represent a pecuniary interest because decisions made by the council concerning the university’s land use would directly impact his salary.
But as a professor, Drebin said he is only an employee and his salary does not represent an interest that would prevent him from voting on matters relating to NU.
“(Newman) is a lawyer and he should know that,” Drebin said.
Newman also responded to the question of whether the Corporation Counsel’s precedent bars anyone from NU, if elected to City Council, from voting on any matter related to the university.
Newman said employees living in wards where NU doesn’t own as much land as in the First Ward could vote on matters concerning the university.
“Northwestern employees live all over the city,” Newman said.
Addressing another campaign issue, Newman questioned the propriety of an advertisement run in recent issues of the Evanston Roundtable and the Evanston Review that endorses Drebin and four other City Council candidates.
The advertisement, titled “Corridors of Condos and Crack” and sponsored by a group called the New Evanston Alliance, criticizes the current City Council.
Drebin said the advertisement came from an independent group with which he had no affiliation and that no agreement existed between any of the candidates endorsed by the advertisement.
