reprinted from

July 23, 2006

Otto brings DFL campaign for state auditor to Bemidji

Brad Swenson Bemidji Pioneer

Property taxes and competency top Rebecca Otto's issues for her run at State Auditor Patricia Anderson.

Otto, a former state representative from Marine on St. Croix who carries the DFL endorsement, says Republican Anderson advocates policies that have forced local governments to raise property taxes.

She should instead advocate for local governments, making sure they are held accountable but have the resources to do their work, Otto said.

"As state auditor you work very closely with local governments," Otto said last week in an interview while in Bemidji. "You understand their financial position very clearly. You understand what their challenges are and what they're doing, their financial health."

When the state faced a $4.5 billion state budget deficit, Anderson, "under the guise of no-new-taxes, said they're (local governments) are flush with money -- they've got plenty, let's cut them further," Otto said, adding that Anderson advocated even greater cuts than which were done.

Cuts in Local Government Aid and other costs pushed to local governments since 2003 have caused a $2.1 billion increase in property taxes, says Otto.

"Do you know what the cuts have done?" Otto asks. "They've increased property taxes."

Also a result is a reduction in services such as police and fire protection and roads. Otto also blasted Anderson for ruling that libraries, parks and transit are not essential services.

"When is a library not an essential service?" Otto said. "Her point is, figure out how to fund it otherwise. And that means increasing property taxes again."

The state auditor doesn't get a button to push to vote on policy in the Legislature, Otto says, but she wants to focus on the future in strengthening Minnesota communities.

"Strengthening communities as state auditor means being an advocate for good state and federal policy," she said, "policies that strengthen our communities rather than weaken them."

When lawmakers start taking about cutting LGA, Otto said she would advocate that the cuts "go too far for Bemidji, or goes way too far for Crookston. Right now, that city is finding it very hard to provide even the basics."

Compliance is equally important, Otto said, and as state auditor she would fulfill her role as "watchdog" over local government financial practices. "I don't believe state and local governments are separate and totally on their own. I believe that I serve as the bridge between state and local government as the auditor."

Otto said her goal is to make local governments successful in delivering services to their citizens. "Right now, we're doing a ramp up of property taxes, and it's regressive and it's in the wrong direction."

It's part of the Republican mantra for a no-new-taxes agenda, Otto says, and is instead hiking local taxes.

"It's really inappropriate for an auditor to carry out an agenda like that," she said. "You're there for good government; you're there for efficient and effective government, not an agenda."

As a constitutional officer, the focus should be on communities, "strengthening communities ... helping them be financially successful, make sure no one's pocketing the money, obviously," she said.

Otto also blasts the incumbent, who is seeking a second term, for too many errors which could signal a credibility problem.

Among them, Otto cited accounting errors in major financial reports on education and county finances, to the theft of three laptops containing sensitive personal identity information from the State Auditor's Office.

'She's obviously gone through everything," Anderson said of Otto in an interview last month. "It's all on my Web site, which is so much more than any of my predecessors."

Anderson said the education error was caused by the state Education Department, not her office, but was corrected when discovered. The county finances error was in one column depicting the percent change between one year and the next, and had been on the Web site for six months and mailed to each county with no comment received.

"It was a mistake," said Anderson. "Our stuff is always completely accurate, except this one thing.  It was a screw-up; I admit that. Was it important? No."

Otto disagrees.

"But it is important. If we can't count on the integrity of the members of that office, we've got a big problem," she said. "In that position, you're a leader and a manager. It's a managerial job in Minnesota; you're the spokesperson and you're the visionary. As a manager, you want to make sure that there's quality control in that office.

"If we can't count on the integrity of the numbers coming out of that office, what can we count on?" Otto asks. "That's one of the functions of that office."

She called them "very, very sloppy errors."

In the county report, Otto said Anderson previously "demonized" counties for hefty fund balances at a time when those balances were needed for cash flow between the twice-a-year property tax collections, and the most recent report error make it look worse.

"When it was a total miscalculation in that column over and over and yet she paid no attention to it this time," Otto said.

"No other auditor has been called on the carpet for major errors in reports," she said.

Anderson takes great pride in the amount of information she's able to provide to the public through numerous reports on county, city, school district and even municipal liquor operations finances. But Otto says time may be better spent elsewhere.

"I want to find out if we're pumping out useful information," the Democrat said. "Are we doing reports too often? Are the requirements reasonable? ... We have to make sure accountability is always built in, but on the other hand, I don't think you pump out reports just to pump out reports."

Otto says she believes in local control but not in micromanaging communities. Anderson, Otto says, has a reputation of being a "gotcha" state auditor, ready to jump on communities which stray in their practices.

"It's not your job to micromanage," Otto said. "An absolute key role of this office is compliance to good accounting standards ... The problem right now is she's playing so much gotcha politics that they don't trust her, they don't want to go to her. They want to hide."

Local governments can't be abandoned by the state, Otto said.

Otto, as state auditor, wants to help local governments with long-term financial planning, instead of short-term, "penny-wise and pound-foolish decisions we're making. ... This election is about the future and what kind of future we want as a state. I don't want to be mediocre."

Otto served one term in the House, has run a business and has been a public school teacher. She specialized on school financing issues while in the Legislature.

She and her husband, Shawn, have one son. Shawn Otto is a screenwriter, whose credits include "House and Sand and Fog."