Well, there he goes again.

Former Alpharetta City Councilman John Monson, already under fire for putting "Re-Elect" and "Republican" on his campaign paraphernalia in a non-partisan race where he is not the incumbent, is now likely to face fines and ethics charges in his race to capture the Alpharetta city council seat of political ally David Belle Isle in Tuesday's special election. 

Belle Isle resigned from the Alpharetta city council in April when he filed his candidacy for the state senate, eventually finishing a close third in the July GOP Republican primary. John Albers won the D-56 state senate seat in an August runoff.

Now Monson is in a tight battle with another former Alpharetta Councilman, Jim Paine.

But his recent campaign financial disclosure, released by Alpharetta city officials on Friday afternoon, contains a clear ethics violation that threatens to sink his campaign in the waning days of the election.

At issue is the dollar amount of in-kind services provided by a website and marketing company, Inward Solutions, based in Alpharetta, to Monson's campaign. The company is listed as donating $10,000 to Monson for the campaign's website creation and management, and other services.

State ethics law caps any company donation to a municipal candidate at $2,400, whether it be cash or in-kind service delivery. The $10,000 listed on Monson's disclosure from Inward Solutions, which the candidate signed and dated in front of a notary on October 22, is triple the amount allowed by Georgia ethics law. The marketing firm's President, Carl Fisher, was not available for comment by press time.

House Ethics Chair Joe Wilkinson (R-Sandy Springs) said, while he cannot comment on a potential case, the ethics law that governs donations is clear. "The maximum contribution that can be made to a municipal candidate is $2,400 per election cycle,"

Wilkinson said. A $10,000 contribution would be a violation that is over four times the maximum allowed.

Inward Solutions re-launched the City of Alpharetta's website a few years ago, at which time it had a contract with city. Neither Alpharetta Mayor Arthur Letchas nor city administrator Bob Regus could confirm if Inward Solutions still had an active contract with the city over the weekend. However, the marketing company lists Alpharetta as one of their current clients on their promotional website.

If they do, and if Monson were to get elected, he naturally would have to recuse himself from voting on any contract that involved Inward.

MONSON CLAIMS IT’S A "TYPO" 

When contacted on Saturday, Monson sent a text message explaining that it was a "typo", and that his report would be amended on Monday at City Hall. "Yes, I fat-fingered it on the spreadsheet and was out of town and someone copied it over on the PDF doc.," Monson said in his text message. "It should be $1,500, not $10,500 (Monson listed another in-kind donation, $500 from "Political Voicemail.com", a Robo-call service provider). I'll be submitting an amendment on Monday."

But Monson signed the form in front of a notary public, Lynn Kennedy, Alpharetta's assistant city clerk, on Friday October 22, 2010. So he could not have been out of town on that date.

City officials said Monson filed his disclosure with the city clerk at approximately 3:30 PM on Friday afternoon.

When asked for supportive documents for further clarification, Monson did not return calls.

The other potential discrepancy in Monson's account is the level of services provided by Inward Solutions. His campaign has a fully functional interactive website, which runs video and takes campaign donations online. In addition, the firm lists the services they are providing Monson's campaign in their promotional materials posted on their website. One brochure reads, "On September 21, Inward Solutions launched John Monson's website…Inward Solutions is involved with the strategy building and implementation of John Monson's campaign."

Adding more doubt to Monson's "fat-finger typo" explanation was a campaign email he sent to supporters at approximately 10 a.m. on Saturday, October 23. The email claims his campaign had significantly outraised Paine's.

 But absent the $10,000 from Inward, Paine actually raised more money than Monson for the reporting period, $11,380 to $7,631 ($8,400 of Paine's came from a campaign loan, which Paine says was based on donation pledges he had received in the last several days).

Monson listed $17,631 as his campaign contributions to date, including in-kind. The Inward portion accounted for nearly 60 percent of his entire campaign war chest.

House Sub-Committee Appropriations Chair Chuck Martin (R-Alpharetta), a former Alpharetta mayor who has endorsed Paine, said the services listed by Inward Solutions were "clearly worth more than $1,000." Martin surmised that the $10,000 listed on the disclosure was most likely accurate. Monson's expenditures listed on his disclosure did not include any payments to Inward Solutions, or any other campaign consulting firm or website design company. "If this is Inward Solutions going rate for the work they have provided to Monson, then I'll ask them to do the same thing for all 105 Republican House caucus members in Georgia," Martin said.

If Monson does indeed amend his disclosure on Monday, he will likely get hit with an ethics charge, anyway, said one Alpharetta official.

Martin said that amending Monson's disclosure on Monday would likely force Inward Solutions' company representatives to have to swear to the $1,000 fee under oath in front of an ethics commission. "I doubt that scenario will play out," Martin said.

If Inward Solutions maintains the $10,000 figure as the cost of their services provided to Monson, the candidate would have no choice but to cut them a check for $7,600, the difference between what was disclosed on the form and the state mandated contribution limit.

OTHER CORPORATE DONATIONS COME UNDER FIRE

Paine supporters also questioned two other corporate donations given to Monson: $2,400 from Republic Services, the city's waste management company, and $1,000 from Al Holbrook, the developer the city chose as for the proposed downtown city center that got put on hold last year.

No other Alpharetta council member or candidate has obtained campaign contributions from contracted city vendors.

Martin put it in perspective: "If Monson is elected, he'll have to recuse himself more times than he votes."

Paine said the cloud now surrounding Monson was not surprising. "It's typical John Monson," Paine said. "Either he's in violation of the ethics law or he can't fill out a simple campaign form correctly, or he does not have a handle on over half of his own financing. Either way it shows either a lack of financial acumen or a blatant disregard for the law."

Paine called Monson's city vendor contributions a "pattern of consistent behavior." The election is November 2.