Baker sought no-bid contract for firm

Then he asked maker of voting machines to hire his girlfriend

By Jim Tankersley, Rocky Mountain News
February 5, 2004

Tracy Baker asked Arapahoe County to give a Texas company a no-bid $3.5 million voting-machine contract.

Then he asked the company to hire his girlfriend.

The company, Hart InterCivic, said no to Baker's request that it hire Leesa Sale, who is also his assistant chief deputy.

But it did spend nearly $4,000 over 16 months on meals, golf and other gifts for Baker and his staff.

Arapahoe County commissioners twice said no to the Hart voting system, first in the summer of 2002, then again last November, after deciding to put the contract out to bid.

Baker, the county clerk and recorder, is facing a recall election Feb. 24, stemming, in part, from allegations he has mismanaged his office.

Baker said Wednesday there was nothing unusual or wrong about his asking Hart to consider hiring Sale as an account manager.

Voting machine companies, he said, frequently call him to inquire about openings. Two supervisors from his office have gone to work for companies that sell election equipment, Baker said.

"Vendors are always looking at people with election experience," he said.

Between April 2001 and August 2002, Hart spent $3,759.95 on Baker and his staff, company records indicate. That included a $495 golf outing and $30 worth of cigars for Baker's birthday.

It could have been more. The company turned Baker down when he asked Hart to pay for staff hotel rooms on a trip to Texas in 2002.

"You call any county clerk in this state," Baker said. "You call any county commissioner. Vendors take you to dinner."

Lisa Doran, a public information specialist in the Secretary of State's Office, said Baker has a point. Donetta Davidson, Colorado's secretary of state, accepted dinner from vendors when she was the Arapahoe County clerk, Doran said.

Susan Beckman, county commission chairman, disapproves of the practice.

"I've never had a vendor buy me a meal; I've never had a vendor buy me a round of golf," she said. "It might be something everybody does. I don't."

Last September, county officials asked Hart to detail gifts and communications between the company's employees and county workers.

The company responded by listing the meals and gifts. It also said Baker phoned an employee in early 2003 to ask if Hart would consider hiring Sale.

The employee told Baker "it would not be appropriate for Hart to do so," Ted Simmonds, a Hart vice president, wrote the Arapahoe County attorney last year.

Simmonds was out of the office and could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

Beckman said commissioners didn't consider Baker's relationship with Hart when they held off on buying voting machines in November.

Commissioners, she said, didn't want to buy machines before new federal voting requirements are clarified. And with the recall looming, they didn't want to rush into a $3.5 million purchase.

tankersleyj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-892-5219