FORT MITCHELL — The Republican challenger in the Kenton County attorney's race Wednesday called for state officials to investigate whether opponent Garry Edmondson, the Kenton County attorney, used county tax dollars to publish “a self-promotional” newsletter for his constituents.

Edmondson

Deters

        Eric Deters, who will face Mr. Edmondson in the May primary, also questioned the legality of $3,600 in rent payments that he says the county made to Mr. Edmondson's private law office last year.

        Mr. Edmondson, a Fort Wright Republican who has served as the county attorney for eight years, denied any wrongdoing.

        Mr. Deters made his allegations in an inch-thick document he released at a press conference in his Fort Mitchell law office.

        “The No. 1 question that comes out of all this documentation is, "Is Garry Edmondson using the taxpayers' money under the bad check fund as a personal and political slush fund?'” Mr. Deters asked.

        Mr. Edmondson said the Summons newsletters, which his office periodically published from late 1995 to April 2001 to inform different groups about various legal issues, were financed by a state-required fee that individuals pay to the county attorney's office when they write a bad check to a local merchant. By law, he said, the fees can be used at the county attorney's discretion. “The bad check funds are not taxpayer money,” Mr. Edmondson said.

        Mr. Edmondson said he has run much of the bad check program out of the basement of his private law office on Fifth Street in Covington, as a convenience to Kenton County merchants trying to collect on bad checks.

        Mr. Edmondson said “It is legal and customary (for county attorneys in Kentucky) to pay for rent for private office space” out of the bad check fees because county business often is conducted in private law offices.

        Mr. Deters also asked whether county dollars paid for the recent “Why I Love America” calendar contest for Kenton County schoolchildren to benefit families of rescue workers who died Sept. 11.

        “Garry Edmondson is the only public official in Northern Kentucky that has used the September tragedy for economic and political benefit,” Mr. Deters said.

        Mr. Edmondson said the calendar is being subsidized through private donations and bad check fees. He said they are still being sold, and donations are still coming in.

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