The Republican candidate for Baltimore County executive said a campaign ad featuring his opponent violates a county rule that prohibits sheriff?s deputies from engaging in political activity while in uniform.
The ad features incumbent executive Jim Smith ? considered the favorite for Tuesday?s election ? Democratic state?s attorney nominee Scott Shellenberger and “recognizable” deputies in official county-issued uniform, said Clarence Bell, Smith?s challenger. He said the ad violates rules he pulled directly from the county sheriff?s manual and asked state prosecutors to investigate.
“I understand regulations such as this and have made campaign and personal sacrifices to comply with similar regulations and I am shocked [by] the blatant disregard for these rules by a former judge, a prominent attorney, the Sheriff and two commissioned officers of the Sheriff?s office,” Bell said in a statement. “Surely they should have known this was in violation of county policy.” Bell is commander of the Maryland State Police?s Waterloo Barracks.
But that policy only applies to the county?s police department, said Smith campaign spokesman Sterling Clifford, who said Sheriff R. Jay Fisher consulted with the Maryland attorney general before approving the ad.
Sheriff?s deputies, he said, are allowed to engage in political activity if they obscure the name of their agency on their uniform.
The agency name appears blurred in the ad, Clifford said.
“We took Sheriff Fisher?s OK and the attorney general?s OK and human resources said it was OK,” Clifford said. “The deputies wereoff the clock, they volunteered to be in the ad and it passes muster with the county employment policy and all the relative laws.”
A spokesman for Attorney General Joe Curran could not confirm if an attorney consulted with the campaigns on the ad. He referred additional questions to counsel for the State Ethics Commission, who did not return phone calls by press time.
Part of the Baltimore Examiner’s 2006 Election Coverage
