Evidentiary Hearing Update

The evidentiary hearing of our complaint against Rebecca Cave and the Maplewood Firefighters Association, Inc. for claiming endorsement by 'Maplewood Fire' lasted from 9:30 AM to 12:30 PM on Monday October 1st, at the Office of Administrative Hearings (OAH) new location in St. Paul.

Since this is an expedited hearing, the OAH judicial panel hearing the complaint will issue its decision within three days of closing the record on the hearing. So, we should have a decision by Thursday afternoon.

While we wait, we want to point out a key victory we have already won. In the design of Minnesota Statutes Chapter 211 (Campaign practices) the Legislature delegated the duty to police campaign practices to citizens. The Maplewood Voters Coalition has demonstrated that when citizens are confident that the law has been violated, they can stand up and have their complaint heard. The Office of Administrative Hearings has made the process of ordinary people pursuing a complaint as unintimidating as possible for a legal proceeding.

We can stand up. We can insist on the rule of law.

Bob Schmidt and Stephan Flister