Last-minute knives are flying over accusations of dirty campaign tactics in the race for Place 6 on the Bellaire City Council.
Last night, current council members made ambiguous comments about a candidate or multiple candidates who allegedly resorted to negative campaigning and personal attacks.
“The candidates have worked hard to say what they represent and what they stand for, that’s what it should be about,” said Councilman Jim Avioli on Monday. “Not personal vendettas and personal attitudes.”
InstantNewsBellaire first reported the comments were aimed at mayoral candidate Robert Riquelmy, who has voiced harsh and continuous criticism about his opponent, Mayor Cindy Siegel. But council members were actually referring to Jim Hotze and Scott Scheinthal, two candidates running for the Place 6 council seat.
Part of the controversy stems from a mailer that Hotze sent last week. It compared himself side-by-side with opponent Mandy Nathan in multiple categories like profession, education and politics. The mailer mentioned Nathan voted in Democratic primaries while Hotze voted in Republican primaries.
“Some people felt it was unfair, and others said it was just politics,” said Corbett Parker, a candidate running for Place 5 on the council.
Hotze said everything in his mailer was factually accurate, and he was just trying to give voters information to make a decision.
“I think the voters should be trusted to look at the information and analyze it and come to their conclusions,” Hotze said.
“If someone is able sit down and point out and see what was offensive, I sure would be willing to listen to it,” Hotze added. “I didn’t call her any names, unless ‘community activist’ is a bad thing.”
Most of the veiled comments from council members were directed at Scheinthal. Council members say he has cited inaccurate facts in his campaign.
For example, at the Oct. 15 Bellaire Area Candidates’ Forum, Scheinthal said the city was wasting $250,000 on art for the new fire station, “which is inaccurate,” said Mayor Cindy Siegel.
The council once discussed spending the money on art, Siegel said, but that item was eventually removed from the budget. She said that Scheinthal has also said that Bellaire’s tax rate is increasing, but in fact it’s been cut substantially over the last 12 years.
“That’s sort of disappointing they think to win the election they have to fall back on this type of campaigning,” Siegel said about Hotze and Scheinthal’s campaigns. “That’s sort of Washington politics, I don’t think that it belongs in Bellaire.”
Mayor Pro Tem Peggy Faulk also made comments at the meeting, and she said later she was referring to Scheinthal’s alleged misrepresentations of these same facts, which she first heard when she watched a DVD from the candidates’ forum.
“He has been told on multiple occasions that what he says is not true, and he continues to say those things,” Faulk said. “That makes me question his integrity.”
Scheinthal said that as far as he knows, everything he has cited during his campaign is accurate. He said no one spoke with him about his facts being untrue.
“Not one member of council has talked with me about anything,” Scheinthal said.
While he wasn’t present at last night’s meeting, Scheinthal said he heard about council members’ comments from another candidate and he suspected they were spurred by an email he sent to some members of Bellaire’s Jewish community. The email stated that Scheinthal was the only Jewish candidate in the election, listed his positions on several issues and asked for residents’ votes.
Faulk said she didn’t know about the email until after last night’s council meeting, but that it did end up offending her and some of her friends who showed her the email.
Mandy Nathan, Scheinthal’s opponent for the Place 6 seat, said she didn’t take offense at the email to Jewish residents, but she mentioned another message Scheinthal allegedly sent to HISD parents that stated his opponents supported putting apartments in downtown Bellaire.
“Jim Hotze and I didn’t say it,” Nathan said. “I have been told by people who have opened the door to him he’s been misrepresenting my views.”
Scheinthal said he thinks council members owe him an apology for their comments at last night’s meeting.
“What’s obvious to me is council has a candidate they want to win, and they’re upset that I’m rocking the boat,” Scheinthal said. He added later: “To my knowledge, is everything I’ve said in my campaign accurate? Yes. To the best of my knowledge it’s accurate.”
Facebook Comments