The City of Oak Hill has responded to a blog post by News 2’s Adam Kleinheider profiling Oak Hill City Manager Bill Kraus. Kraus is a vocal opponent of expansion plans on the property of the Governor’s Oak Hill residence.
It has come to the City’s attention that its City Manager Bill Karus did not discuss certain real estate legal events, which occurred over 20 years ago in California, when he was hired in 2003. At the time of his hiring in 2003 adequate references and credentials were checked and satisfactory responses were obtained.
[The City Of Oak Hill Confirms City Manager Did Not Discuss Past Legal Trouble During Hiring - Volunteer Voters - 11-12-07]
The “certain real estate legal events” they refer to is just one brush with the law during Kraus’s political career. According to the L.A. Times, his role in a real estate fraud ring led to Kraus pleading guilty to federal mail fraud charges in 1987. Friday, Kleinheider retraced Kraus’s political life back to a time when he was once barred from public office.
Kraus left his job as Norwalk city administrator in 1983 amid a city investigation of his business dealings.
Three years later, the district attorney’s office charged him with failing to report $ 60,000 in personal loans, and he pleaded no contest to one misdemeanor count. He was sentenced to a $ 1,000 fine or 330 hours of community service and barred for three years from serving in public office.
In a separate case, Kraus pleaded guilty in 1987 to a federal charge of mail fraud for his role in a fraud ring selling artificially inflated real estate in Utah and California. After cooperating with authorities, Kraus was sentenced to five years probation, a $ 1,000 fine and $ 20,000 in restitution.
After those convictions, Kraus was expelled from the International City Management Assn., a Washington-based trade organization of city administrators and managers.
[Official Quits After Record Is Revealed; Government: Baldwin Park leaders say they were unaware of interim city manager's fraud conviction when they hired him. - LATimes - 04-24-98]
In 1998, Kraus resigned his position as interim city manager for Baldwin Park, CA because of this article. Kraus responded to the L.A. Times article and blog post over the weekend.
“These are things that happened 20 to 30 years ago,” said Kraus, “I didn’t see the relevance then and I don’t see the relevance now.”
[Los Angeles Times Article Reveals Oak Hill City Manager’s Past - Volunteers Voters - 11-09-07]
TN Republican Party Communications Director Bill Hobbs jumped into the story yesterday asking Kleinheider several times how he came across this information and to reveal his sources.
“How did the info surface? Did you find it on your own or did someone point you to it, and if it is the latter, who?”
Bill Hobbs - November 12th, 2007 at 12:43 pm“The reason he should reveal that much info is this: Kraus made an allegation in the story that the story was dug up to use against him during this fight over the Bredesen Bunker.”
Bill Hobbs – November 12th, 2007 at 12:55 pm“I’m asking him to reveal if there was or wasn’t a source that brought him the old LA Times story on Kraus, and if someone brought it to him, did the person have a connection to the Bredesens. That’s all.”
Bill Hobbs - November 12th, 2007 at 3:38 pm
So much for freedom of speech. This is OBVIOUSLY a blatant attempt by The Governor’s Staff & particularly Andrea Conte’s staff to smear the name of an opposing public official. It’s obvious that this smear is about the investigation of the use of state money for the new Governor’s Bunker. In the process, they have smeared a man & his family, who already paid his debt to society 20 years ago. If this is how our Governor does business, I’m glad this is his last term!
The Governor’s office responds here.