BACKUS - The Cass County Board voted Tuesday to seek new state legislation to require people involved in a lawsuit alleging illegal campaign practices or the municipality or school district involved to pay legal and judicial costs for the suit.
In 2004, state law transferred campaign practices challenges from one prosecuted by county attorneys in district court to one heard before an administrative law judge panel.
Cass County will have paid $6,200 for such hearings since 2004 by the end of this year.
The latest case involved John T. Thomas' challenge of Ken Braswell's donation of a computer to the city of Hackensack. Braswell was a candidate for city council at the time he made the donation.
The law judge panel found Braswell did not violate campaign practice laws in making the donation. Cass County will pay $1,096 for legal fees and the judges involved in that case.
Administrator Robert Yochum referred Kitchigami Library Director Marian Ridge to the county's Dec. 4 truth-in-taxation hearing to seek the additional $12,659 the library board needs to meet expenses next year over the $326,795 minimum state required contribution the county's budget committee recommended paying.
Ridge told the board Tuesday the library district proposes to give employees a 3 percent wage increase and to pay some employees health care benefits in 2009. Library costs for such items as fuel also have risen, she said.
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