Montgomery councilwoman yanks release from Web site

Questions arise about propriety of using county resources for political announcement

The Dec. 21 release described her plans to travel to Iowa to campaign for New York Sen. Hillary Clinton in advance of the Jan. 3 caucuses.

Dan Clements, the lawyer, asked the county ethics commission to decide whether the release was appropriate.

The release was removed from the Web site at about 3 p.m. Thursday.

‘‘She thought it was such an item of inconsequence that it wasn’t worth spending any more time on it,” said Neil H. Greenberger, spokesman for the Montgomery County Council.

Council Vice President Philip M. Andrews, who was executive director of Common Cause of Maryland from 1988 to 1994, praised Trachtenberg for removing the release.

‘‘It’s down, and I think that’s good,” said Andrews (D-Dist. 3) of Gaithersburg. ‘‘I give her credit for recognizing it should come down. I think there needs to be a bright line between council activity and personal endorsements, and she recognized that.”

Trachtenberg (D-At large) of North Bethesda did not return a call seeking comment Thursday. On Wednesday, she called the release reasonable.

‘‘I think it’s legitimate to present information to the general public on the activities that council members are engaged in,” said Trachtenberg, a first-term councilwoman. ‘‘I certainly didn’t see this as anything inappropriate.”

Clements said he asked the Montgomery County Ethics Commission via an e-mail to decide whether the release and Web site posting violated any ethics laws because it involved personal political activities distributed using county resources and county employees.

‘‘The removal is appropriate, and obviously she has realized the posting was inappropriate,” said Clements, who makes no bones about the partisanship in his question. He is supporting Illinois Sen. Barack Obama.

Barbara McNally, the commission’s executive secretary, could not be reached for comment.

Michael Faden, the council’s senior legislative attorney, said Wednesday that he did not believe the Trachtenberg release represented an ethics violation because the activities of an elected official are of public interest.

Even so, a member of the county’s legal staff would go through opinions of state and county ethics commissions, he said.

Mary L. Boyle, a vice president for Common Cause, said the county Web site is no place for electioneering.

‘‘I think it’s illustrative that a lot of elected officials ... don’t play close attention to the difference between their role in helping people and their role as a politician who wants to get elected and help other people get elected,” she said.

Trachtenberg is a past president of Maryland National Organization for Women and serves as mid-Atlantic regional director on the NOW national board.

She justified the item, saying her trip to Iowa would involve NOW forums, not Clinton campaign events.

Trachtenberg said the announcement was similar to council members describing their out-of-town speaking engagements.

‘‘Council members do have schedules outside the council building,” she said.

But the six-paragraph statement puts the emphasis on the political elements of the trip. The main headline reads: ‘‘Councilmember Duchy Trachtenberg Heads to Iowa to Help Clinton Campaign.” A smaller headline reads: ‘‘Montgomery County Legislator Has Been Asked to Speak About the Candidate with NOW Activists.”

The first paragraph of the release says she ‘‘will be spending part of the holidays campaigning in Iowa for Senator Hillary Clinton ahead of that state’s presidential caucuses.”

The fourth paragraph notes Trachtenberg made the motion at a May 2007 NOW board meeting that led to the organization endorsing Clinton’s presidential bid. Her NOW appearances are mentioned in the next-to-last paragraph.

William Klein, a Trachtenberg aide who handles the councilwoman’s press, said he asked Greenberger whether the release was appropriate before distributing it.

Greenberger said, ‘‘I never turn anyone down. I don’t think it’s in my authority to do that.”

He said he did not see the release as a political statement; rather, it was a statement on what a council member was doing.

Greenberger sent the release to reporters, he said, because he could send it out easily.

‘‘I can’t imagine there’s anything inappropriate about this,” Trachtenberg said Wednesday.