Earlier this summer, Julie Anne Kempf, the county's Assistant Superintendent of Elections, turned up a set of documents that had been missing since November 1998. She claimed that the records -- monthly reports from King County's 33rd District Democrats -- had been in the office all along, but that they had been misfiled. Kempf's statement wouldn't have warranted a second look, except that the woman who was in charge of filing the reports in the first place is Kempf's mother, the 33rd District Dems' treasurer, Lucille Kempf. Julie Anne Kempf's sudden "discovery" of the errant documents has raised eyebrows among people familiar with the situation. They say Kempf may be pulling a fast one on state regulators (even going so far as to backdate the records) in order to cover her mother's behind.
It took a nosy Republican activist to first discover the missing records. Last November, Don Mason, then chair of the 33rd District Republicans, went down to the Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) office in Olympia to look up the financial records on his rival organization, and couldn't find reports for the entire 1998 election cycle. Districts must file these records with the PDC and King County Records and Elections to ensure that their finances and contributions are on the up and up.
Mason complained to the PDC, and investigator Doug Ellis took up the case. He found that neither the PDC nor King County had any record of receiving the required reports from the 33rd District Dems between September 1, 1997 and November 22, 1998. He also found minor contribution violations and fined the 33rd District Democrats $2,475. The 33rd District had just issued a heartfelt apology to their members when Julie Anne Kempf made her remarkable and puzzling discovery.
The way Julie Anne Kempf tells it, she was the last person in the elections operations office on July 7 when she fielded a call from someone who wanted to see the 33rd District Dems' filings. The caller had just read the newsletter statement from 33rd District Democrats Chair Dave Upthegrove explaining that the group had been fined after their treasurer (Lucille Kempf) failed to turn in a year's worth of reports. Julie Anne, aware that her mother's credibility was at stake, says she started rummaging through various filing cabinets looking for the missing documents and turned them up -- with the correct date stamps -- in a file marked Republican District 33.
The following day, she asked for conflict-of-interest relief from the matter. Julie Moore, who works under Kempf as Election Operations Supervisor for King County, took over. Moore immediately sent out two memos -- one to Susan Harris, Assistant Director of Compliance at the PDC, and another to Upthegrove at the 33rd District Dems -- explaining that the records had turned up. King County had goofed in November, she wrote, when they originally told the PDC they didn't have the files.
Meanwhile, Julie Anne Kempf tried to clear her mother's name with Upthegrove and the 33rd District Dems' board. On July 18, Kempf attended an emergency board meeting in Burien, which was called to discuss whether or not the group -- in light of the "recovered" documents -- should appeal the fine they'd been saddled with by the PDC. Kempf, sitting beside her mother, told the 15 board members that King County had received the files in a timely manner. "She was there to defend her mom," recalls District 33 Vice Chair Emily Willoughby, who was at the meeting.
Julie Anne Kempf's claims, however, are clouded by more than a few mysteries. First, and most obviously, why would the missing documents suddenly show up at the King County offices, but not at the PDC offices when they were supposed to have been filed at the same time?
Second, if the "original" files were discovered at King County, there should be two copies of the files there. Here's why: According to Ellis, after contacting Lucille Kempf about the missing records, it would have been standard procedure for a longtime treasurer like Kempf to send second copies to the county and state.
Lucille Kempf couldn't be reached for comment, but Julie Anne Kempf says her mother never sent second copies to the county, a claim that doesn't make sense. The Stranger obtained three faxes sent by Lucille Kempf to King County Elections offices. They were faxed in December, immediately after the PDC launched its investigation. The elder Kempf's faxes notified King County of the PDC investigation. Why would Kempf alert King County about the missing files and then fail to send them? More importantly, if King County was aware the files were missing as early as December, why didn't the files show up until July -- when Julie Anne went looking for them?
The most compelling evidence of a cover-up comes from Ellis' PDC investigation, which found inconsistencies in King County's records. His report concluded that usual procedures were not followed when the documents were filed. While checking King County's database, Ellis found instances where the computer record of receipt differed from the date stamped on the hard copy, including one instance when the computer database listed a document as "received" prior to the date on the hard copy. He also found strange dates on the hard copies, like "August 34." In King County's defense, former staffer Jen Porter says the errors could be explained by the fact that records are often entered by unpaid volunteers.
Finally, when contacted by The Stranger, Bob Bruce, King County's Superintendent of Elections, completely contradicted Kempf's story. In two separate phone conversations, Bruce stated that King County's computer records show the files were not received in 1998, and that the hard copy records had been backdated. "They were not here in 1998, and they were not here when the PDC was looking for them," Bruce said. "They were subsequently received and backdated. I admit it looks curious because of the relationship between Julie Anne and her mother."
