NEW PALESTINE — Town council members have raised concerns surrounding the 2019 election of Clerk-Treasurer Tonii Pyle, suggesting she and her father-in-law, former town manager David Book, may have violated campaign laws when they were trying to get her name on the ballot.
The council members have asked for an investigation; the county election board will take up the matter this week.
According to council members, Book, who was the town manager at the time Pyle was campaigning for the position in 2019, brought a nomination sign-up sheet into town hall during business hours and asked town employees as well as people entering the building to sign it.
Council members are accusing Book and Pyle, who was working as the town’s deputy clerk-treasurer at the time, of basically running Pyle’s campaign out of town hall. The two even asked people attending council meetings to sign the petition for Pyle while they were at town hall, council members say.
Indiana law says a state employee cannot engage in political activity, including solicitation of political contributions, from another employee or special state appointee; or any other person when on duty or acting in an official capacity.
Council president Brandee Bastin recalls Book and Pyle, who ran as an independent, asking her to sign the petition after a council meeting at town hall, but Bastin told them no.
“I also told them they should not be collecting signatures here at town hall on government property,” Bastin said. “Did it stop them or not? I don’t know.”
Council member Angie Fahrnow said she went door-to-door in order to get her name on the ballot in 2019 and saw firsthand what was happening.
“People coming in to pay their sewer bills were asked to sign the petition,” Fahrnow said. “David Book, the town manager at the time and her father-in-law, asked his employees to sign the petition while working in the town hall and on town time.”
Fahrnow said she alerted the election office at the time but did not receive a response.
County Clerk Lisa Lofgreen, whose office oversees county elections, told the Daily Reporter in an email that the office has recently received information about the New Palestine election. It has been forwarded to county election board, she said.
The issue is on the election board agenda for its meeting for 1:30 p.m. Thursday, July 16, in the election office.
Some council members are hoping county officials will deem Pyle’s election invalid, they said.
“My immediate concern is for the election board to acknowledge the signature sheet issue and address what will be done with the situation,” Fahrnow said.
In 2019, Pyle turned in nomination signatures forms with more than 90 signatures; 57 of the signatures were deemed valid by county election officials, which was enough to get her name on the ballot an independent. She ran unopposed after the Republican candidate dropped out of the race before the election.
Council member Bill Niemier also questions the legitimacy of Pyle’s election because of the way she obtained signatures to get on the ballot. He noted he was approached by Book during a council meeting in 2019 and asked to sign the petition and did so as a local citizen.
Niemier was not a council member at that time and said looking back now, it seemed odd that Book, who was attending the meeting in an official capacity, approached him to ask for his signature.
Current council members Clint Bledsoe and Jan Jarson also signed the nomination petition for Pyle. Bledsoe recalled signing the sheet for Pyle when it was sitting on a desk at town hall during business hours.
The challenge to Pyle’s election is the latest development in the deteriorating relationship between Pyle and the council. Interactions have been so contentious that Pyle has a retained a lawyer for her personal use as well as office matters instead of using the town’s attorney. The council has balked at paying for it.
In late June, Pyle sent out a memo to the council essentially issuing an ultimatum: either pay for a lawyer to represent her office, or she’ll stop paying claims.
“In light of the council’s decisions to deny the Clerk-Treasurer’s Office the right to legal representation, it is this office’s decision to discontinue the processing of claims due to lack of legal advice on those matters,” Pyle said in the memo.
Pyle, along with former Clerk-Treasurer Becky Hilligoss, created this year’s budget and did not add any funds for legal assistance for the office. In fact, Pyle’s request to have her own legal representation is the first of its kind. No clerk-treasurer in the town’s history has ever asked for legal representation, Bastin said.
Pyle has requested thousands of dollars to be paid for an attorney she hired amid mounting criticism that she was not performing her duties. The council went so far as to censure the clerk in March for interfering with town business. The censure vote took place at the same meeting at which her father-in-law was fired for a litany of issues.
Pyle closed out the memo with the threat of litigation, “If the requested budgetary appropriations are not resolved in a timely manner, The Clerk Treasurer office will be left with no option but to pursue litigation to enforce its rights under clear Indiana law,” which do allow her to have legal representation in her position.
While town officials have not approved paying Pyle’s lawyer fees, the council has approved $20,000 for consulting fees, which she has already spent to pay Hilligoss and a county accountant to help her do the job.
