Gov. Chet Culver will have five days from the date he receives Taylor’s letter to set a date for the special election, which must be within 120 days of the resignation.

Norm Sterzenbach, Sr., a military veteran who has been a steady presence in county politics for years and currently serves as the county Democrats’ second vice chairman, is expected to make a bid for the seat. Kirsten Running-Marquard, 32, who works in U.S. Rep. Dave Loebsack’s office and is the daughter of former state Rep. Rich Running, has also been contacting local Democrats to drum up support.

Republicans, who nominated former GOP county chairwoman Kathy Potts to run against Taylor in 2008, have not yet indicated who among their membership has interest, but they have pledged to produce a candidate. Potts is seeking a seat on the Cedar Rapids City Council, and she will not be entering the House race.

Taylor entered the legislature following a 2000 special election to replace Kay Halloran, who is now Mayor of Cedar Rapids. The district, which typically elects Democrats, includes 11 precincts primarily on the city’s southwest side.

The special election for the Iowa House seat will be the second in the state this year. In the previous special election, in House District 90, Democrat Curt Hanson bested Republican Stephen Burgmeier by a handful of votes. In that race, conservative special interest groups attempted to make same-sex marriage an issue. In House District 33, because of its demographics, the Democratic nominee will have a strong chance of winning the seat, which means conservative interest groups may take a less active role in the campaign.

In special elections, political parties select nominees at conventions, attended by county party central committee members.

One key factor in deciding the Democratic nomination will be support from labor unions. Sterzenbach is a former business manager with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and is known for his strong ties to labor. His son is executive director of the Iowa Democratic Party. Running-Marquard also has support from other key union members.

Eric Rosenthal, a former chairman of the Linn County Republican Central Committee, has been the subject of an open investigation since November 2007. The charges, filed by former Linn County Republican Chairwoman Kathy Potts in the summer of 2007, stem from checks written by the county party to Rosenthal. He filed in March as a candidate for Linn County Supervisor.

Mike Robinson, a former chairman of the Linn County Democratic Central Committee who suspended his campaign for a state legislature seat in House District 35 in September, is also under the scrutiny by the state agency. Robinson called off his candidacy citing personal reasons prior to the ethics complaint being made public.  The suspension of his campaign, however, was not done early enough for the candidate’s name to be removed from the ballot.

Robinson’s investigation involves the possible co-mingling of personal and campaign funds, as alleged by former members of his campaign committee. Robinson did not respond to Iowa Independent’s request for comment.

Charlie Smithson, executive director of the Iowa Ethics Board, indicated that a formal investigation into the complaints involving Robinson was initiated after a review of his October campaign finance report.

Rosenthal’s alleged violations were the subject of a state panel review last week. While it was hoped that the review might shed light on the case which has been active for nearly a year, Smithson told the Iowa Independent in an e-mail earlier this week that the “situation is not resolved.”

“We have received responses from Mr. Rosenthal and are in the process of looking through that information and checking with vendors and the Linn County Republican Party,” Smithson said. “Unfortunately, we are also now in the middle of the 2008 election with issues coming up that are needing immediate attention.”

Smithson said the board plans to continue the investigation into the allegations, but does not expect the situations to be resolved prior to the November general election.

“In order for the Board to do its due diligence and to be fair to Mr. Rosenthal and Ms. Potts, we are going to do a full and thorough investigation and we are not going to rush any results,” he said. “It would have been useful if this complaint would have been received closer to 2004, and it would have been useful for responses from Mr. Rosenthal to come earlier than June and October of 2008.”

Potts admits that her own hesitation to formally file the complaint against Rosenthal may have presented an obstacle to those who now have to investigate the matter, but she still feels that waiting to officially file was the appropriate thing for her to do.

“I spoke face-to-face with Mr. Smithson in 2005 shortly after I was elected as chair of the Linn County Republicans,” Potts said. “At that point, I told Smithson about the discrepancies and asked for his advice. He told me that since the Democrats were not complaining and because he was now aware of the situation, I didn’t have to do anything else.”

Potts said that she also addressed the matter internally with Republican Party leaders and made an appeal for them to resolve the situation.

“A year later — in 2006 — I resigned because I couldn’t get the committee to do the ethical thing,” she said.

The complaint, which references county party disbursements from the 2004 general election cycle, was filed by Potts in the summer of 2007. The state agency launched its official investigation in November with a letter requesting information and documents from Rosenthal.

That initial letter was answered by John Daufeldt, Rosenthal’s attorney, with a promise for further information in January or February of 2008. The promised response, however, was not given to the state until June. A follow-up by the state garnered more information from Rosenthal’s attorney earlier this month.

Rosenthal said he has not purposefully dragged his feet in responding to the charges, but was overwhelmed by family medical crisis involving both his wife and mother. He adds that much of the information the state needed was difficult to find due to the passage of time.

“I had dramatically scaled back my full-time practice of real estate to deal with these health issues prior to the notice of this complaint on Nov. 16, 2007,” Rosenthal wrote in e-mail to Iowa Independent. “I had to file my nomination papers from the hospital. Friends collected the signatures and the hospital notary notarized the nomination petition.”

Rosenthal said that because he had been involved with the effort to expand the Linn County Board of Supervisors from three to five members and to have all members elected by district (in lieu of at-large), he “wanted to continue to change county government to make it more representative and responsive.”

The fact that Rosenthal received funds from the county Republican party is not in dispute. The investigation focuses on if those funds, which Potts claims were given to Rosenthal for distribution to vendors, were used by Rosenthal for personal benefit.

Documents obtained from the Ethics Board show that Rosenthal presented the Linn County Republican Central Committee with reimbursement forms for two invoices from a local vendor. Potts has stated that shortly after her election as chair, the vendor phoned and requested payment for those same invoices, totaling roughly $600.

“I told him that, according to the books, we’d already paid those bills,” she said. “But he was adamant that he had not been paid so I began to look into it.”

She found a check, written by the Linn County Republican Treasurer to Rosenthal, that had been deposited into his personal banking account. Via his attorney, Rosenthal has not denied depositing the check, but maintains that not only was he owed additional reimbursements, but that disagreements on a county level contributed to the situation.

“I understand why the current discussion of these events focuses on the political ramifications of the investigation,” he said. “However, the deep disagreements within the committee at that time stemmed primarily over, one, how the Sept. 1, 2004 effective date of McCain-Feingold was to be applied at the local level; and, two, prior committee practices that allowed for the expenditures now questioned.”

According to Rosenthal, he had “many unreimbursed expenses as chair,” including furniture for the 2004 headquarters and out-of-town mileage.

Rosenthal, who has used his background in accounting in marketing pushes for his supervisor bid, said the issue “will be resolved by the Board without regard to the political ramifications, as it should be.” He added that this is the same approach he “would advocate professionally,” and the reason why he has “been reluctant to air my side of the story, regardless of the political consequences.”

Republican Iowa House candidate Kathy Potts (Photo: peopleforpotts.com)

Kathy Potts, Republican candidate in Iowa House District 33, said she has been excluded from the event. She said Emma Nemecek, Republican candidate in House District 29, and Joe Childers, who is running in Senate District 18, had also been told that they would not get to appear with McCain.

“Christopher [Rants] and Kraig [Paulsen] are in charge of the event tomorrow with McCain,” said Potts. “They do not want me on stage. They said that I and Emma Nemecek and Joe Childers are losers and that they only want Renee [Schulte] and Nick [Wagner] on stage.”

Rants, a Republican from Sioux City, is House Minority Leader. Paulsen, a Republican state representative from Hiawatha, is Minority Whip. Schulte and Wagner are both Republican candidates for Iowa House.

Nemecek confirmed to the Iowa Independent that her party planned to deny her a prominent position at the event, but said she was able to convince the campaign to give her a seat on stage. Rants, Childers, and Paulsen did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Potts said she contacted Gentry Collins, the McCain campaign’s Midwest regional director, to ask to participate in Thursday’s rally.

“Gentry e-mailed me late last night that he was trying to get me on the stage at the event,” she said. “He told me that Kraig and Chris didn’t want him to put me there. I wrote him back and said that I thought McCain was running his own campaign.”

From Collins’ e-mail, which Potts read over the phone:

“The initial schedule was set according to local event protocol, where the national campaign refers to the legislative leadership on candidates whose campaigns will be most positively impacted by the limited speaking slots available.”

According to Potts, while she would have liked to speak at the event, she mostly just wanted to be recognized on stage with McCain and Palin as a local Republican candidate. “I did fuss enough that I was told that maybe they would put some bleachers behind the stage,” she said, but the campaign did not make any guarantees.

“It comes down to the fact that those two boys — Christopher Rants and Kraig Paulsen — don’t like me at all,” she said. “There was even an article in the [Cedar Rapids] Gazette where Rants said that I didn’t have a chance [of winning] and that I wasn’t popular and that I haven’t lived here long enough.”

Potts said the rift between herself and Republican leaders began when she was elected as chairwoman of the Linn County GOP. After looking over the party’s books and getting unexpected calls about the party’s unpaid bills, she ultimately filed an ethics complaint alleging misconduct.

“Sure, they praise McCain and Palin for being mavericks,” Potts said. “But look what happens when Kathy Potts in Linn County speaks up and tells leadership that there’s corruption in Iowa. Then all they can say is, ‘Sit down. Shut up. We need unity.’”

“This is all just unbelievable,” she said. “The Democrats don’t have to fight us — the Republicans themselves are doing a good enough job.”

When Nemecek heard that she, too, would be excluded from the rally, she said that she lobbied the campaign to obtain a slot.

“I called up the folks in charge and made a case for myself and my campaign,” Nemecek told Iowa Independent by phone Wednesday night. “I told them that leaving me out would be wrong because my race is equally important as all the other races.”

Nemecek, who is seeking a vacated seat in the legislature, knows she is being outspent by her Democratic opponent Nate Willems. She also knows that when she pursued the seat in 2006 against then incumbent Ro Foege, she garnered 40 percent of the vote.

“I am working hard — really working hard,” Nemecek said. “I’ve been working with my supporters to publicize and build participation for this event. Given how hard I’m working both on my race and on this event, I should be there. That was my argument, and I plan to attend and be on stage.”

Nemececk said she does not know whether she will have a chance to address the crowd.

Update:

Iowa Senate candidate Joe Childers sent the following message via e-mail at 1:33 p.m. on Thursday:

“Please correct your article I was invited to and did speak at the MCain [sic] rally.”