Pay to official on trip abroad questioned

DA’s office eyes $1,000 paid to then-Councilman Kirk Cartozian during 56-day leave.
By Jenny Marder, Staff writer

Long Beach Press Telegram

Tuesday, September 07, 2004 – DOWNEY â^À^Ô The Los Angeles County
district attorney’s office is looking into whether about $1,000 in
city stipends that Mayor Kirk Cartozian received while studying in
Armenia last year constitutes a misuse of city funds.

The preliminary investigation comes after a complaint filed by resident
and city gadfly Lennie Whittington on August 8. Whittington and others,
including City Councilwoman Anne Bayer, question whether Cartozian
should have been paid during his 56-day leave of absence.

Cartozian said that, though thousands of miles away, the stipend was
justified because he spent that much money paying for Internet access
and long-distance phone calls while working for about two hours every
day corresponding with city officials and Downey residents.

Cartozian was on the council but not mayor when he was in Armenia
taking an intensive language, cultural and history program from June
18 to August 13, he said.

Under a city ordinance, each council member is allotted about $600
every month to cover gas, phone calls, stamps, stationery, meals away
from home, minor entertainment expenses and other costs incurred in
connection with council duties.

“What they’re intended to do is reimburse council members for expenses
they incur for their role as council member or mayor,” Assistant City
Manager Lee Powell said of the stipends.

Each month while abroad, Cartozian said, he racked up as much as
$300 for e-mail at Internet cafes, where he did most of his work,
and at least a couple of hundred dollars in work-related phone calls.

Council members are not required to submit itemized spending reports.

Members of the Downey City Council do not receive many of the perks
awarded to council members in other cities, such as health insurance,
cars or cell phones.

Whittington plans to demand that the mayor provide evidence of the
work that he did while abroad.

“I don’t think he deserves anything when he’s out of the country,”
Whittington said. “He should not get reimbursed for nothing.”

Bayer also wants proof.

“I think he really owes it to the city of Downey to explain what city
business he was on,” she said.

Cartozian fired back that he has 175 to 200 pages of e-mails sent
during that time, adding that that’s only a fraction of the work that
he did and that he has no record of all the e-mails that he read.

“I don’t do this for money,” he said. “I get close to $9,000 a year
total. â^À¦ And I have verifiable proof of countless hours that I
spent to correspond on a daily basis with City Hall. It’s my job to be
abreast and informed on everything that’s going on in the city. That’s
my life.”

Shirley Conte, council secretary, said she can attest to his work
during that time. He e-mailed or called her every day while in Armenia,
she said.

“When I would send out e-mails to all of the City Council members,
many times I got an answer from him before I heard from anyone else,”
Conte said. “He was definitely in touch all the time.”

David Demerjian, head deputy district attorney of the office’s public
integrity division, said that the complaint is under review and
investigators will determine whether a full investigation is warranted.

Misuse of public funds is a felony, he said.