3 Questions Jane Murray MUST ANSWER (Part 1)

OUR FIRST QUESTION FOR JANE MURRAY 1) Why did you leave Congressman Baesler's office in 1995 and what is the real reason you returned to Portsmouth?

At Thursday night's Mayorial Debate at Shawnee State, Candidate Jane Murray stated in her closing remarks, "Let's just face it, I will be your next mayor."

Well, it seems a bit strange, to us at P-Town Underground, that the City of Portsmouth would elect a woman that we know so little about to control the destiny of our City. There are major gaps in her resume that we thought should be at least looked into. That led us to questions that we would like to have answers to.

Jane Murray tells a life story that is inspiring and impressive. Born in Portsmouth, raised in Greenup, and a graduate of PHS, Ohio State, and UK. After college, she went to work for the mayor of Lexington where she wrote legislation and built museums that were marvelous to behold. When the Bluegrass State became too small to contain her vision she swooped into Washington where she specialized ina dozen areas, according to her website, including the environment, international trade and even "space technology'! Then when she tired of governing the masses, she started her own marketing/lobbying/development firm. Finally when she had conquered the heavens she looked down upon our lowly town, and had compassion on us. So she left her old life behind, moved home, rescued her mother and a pound dog to begin a simple life among the simple folk of southern Ohio. And we are blessed to have her.

She is the humble daughter of Appalachia with a spotless career that rocketed through the heavens in a perfect arc. She has returned to save us from or sins. But is this the true story of our Miss Murray? Here is what we have learned.

Jane's former married name is Jane Vimont. Her husband Tom Vimont was connected to Vimont & Wills, a major law firm in Lexington. (Now it is called Bowles Rice, LLC.) Whether this helped Jane to get a job in the Lexington office of Mayor Scottie Baesler is unknown. However, she worked for Mayor Baeslernfrom 1986 to 1992. When Mr. Baesler was elected to congress in 1992, he took her to Washington as his legislative assistant. Things were going well for Jane and the Congressman, when the Lexington Herald Leader (the largest newspaper in Ky) ran a FRONT PAGE story (9/25/1995) which was very critical of both Congressman Baesler and Murray, who was going by Jane Vimont at the time. The paper accused Baesler as mayor and Vimont-Murray, mentioning her by name, of violating city policy regarding personal expenses "from 1987 to December 1992" (corresponding to Murray-Vimont's time in the office). Despite warnings by auditors of the city's finances, Jane as the mayor's legislative liaison continued to violate the City's policy on credit card use.

Here is a quote from the Herald Leader's story:

Many of the [credit card] charges made by Jane Vimont, the city's legislative liaison under Baesler, also did not include receipts. A $708 American Express bill for July 1991 for example, has no receipts attached and no detail for what the charges were for. A note on the payment voucher says only "cultural center travel." Vimont said she regularly provided receipts, and they must have been lost.

Other violations of City policy by Murray-Vimont included overly expensive meals and lodging, expensive gifts given to public officials (for example, $27 letter openers given to state legislators--this was in 1990 dollars), and excessive economic development trips to Japan, Korea, India, Europe, New Orleans, etc.

This 'page-one' coverage was a serious blow to Baesler who was up for reelection the following year and who was also planning to run for governor (which he did in 1998, but was defeated). Murray's website says she left the Congressman's office in 1995. But according to the Herald-Leader story, she was still employed by Baesler's office on Sept. 25, 1995, so she obviously left after the scandal.

It seems reasonable to us to conclude that Murray-Vimont may have been fired or asked to resign due to her misfeasance of public funds at an embarassing time for Congressman Baesler. We would hope that Murray would answer that question here or by email to ptownu@yahoo.com. However if not we hope that local news media will attempt to get a response.

It is understandable that Murray would shine the best light possible on her past career. That's human nature. We all make mistakes. and we all have things in our pasts that we do not want the world to know.

But what bothers us is that Jane Murray is constantly criticizing the mayor and City officials of breaking the law, of cover-ups, of malfeasance, and of incompetance. She says that WHEN she is elected she "will obey the law"! She claims that the simpletons in office in Portsmouth do NOT know how to read a financial statement or balance accounts and the Portsmouth Times dutifully repeats every word. Yet she knows the whole time that state auditors and newspapers in Kentucky have charged her with the same charges and worse, that she misused City of Lexington funds in violation of state and City policies for her own personal benefit.

People who know Jane Murrayand who supported her in the primary election, have now turned their support to one of the other candidates. The former Murray backers have seen what many of us have seen: Jane Murray thinks she is better than everyone else.

Does Jerry Skiver think he is better than the rest of us? I don't think so.

Is Jim Kalb better than everyone else in Portsmouth? No. Does he think he is better than the rest of us? God, no!! That's why, during his years as Mayor, he has continued to work part-time at Krogers. He has served the City as a City Councilman, as Mayor, and as grocery store employee for many years. Though his critics jeer and make fun of him for this, no one can deny that this has kept him in touch with the citizens of our town. We have not heard of him using his office to take trips to Japan or New Orleans or financially benefit himself in anyway, beyond his salary. (If you have heard of this, let us know.)

Has Jane Murray done anything to benefit our City? Nothing we can think of, even after checking her website. Oh wait. She has a lawsuit against the City. Maybe she thinks that is doing something for the community, but if so , it is not mentioned on her website.

If Jane Murray is elected as Mayor, where will she spend our tax money? In Lexington? In New Orleans? In Japan? Or at the local Kroger's supermarket?

Murray says it's a done deal. She's already won. She IS going to be the next mayor. Well, that's really up to us to decide isn't it?

BE HERE in coming days for more un-asked/un-answered questions for Jane Murray.