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WILKES-BARRE — Mayoral candidate Tony George reiterated he made mistakes preparing his campaign finance reports and said he expects the pending investigation by the Luzerne County District Attorney’s Office to be an issue in the race.

The county election board Thursday referred the case to the district attorney to determine whether George intentionally attempted to deceive the public in his initial filing of the reports that contained discrepancies.

“What was I trying to hide? My problem was I kept poor records,” George said Friday.

The Democratic candidate said he was trying to do everything himself in the campaign. That’s since been changed with a new organizational structure in place and amended reports filed with the county Bureau of Elections.

He acknowledged he will have to address the matter in the race against Republican challenger Frank Sorick, but added his errors did not reflect on his ability to handle the job of leading the largest city in the county.

“The mayor has a controller and finance office. I’m not going to run the whole city myself. That’s why they have all the department heads,” George said.

Sorick accepted George’s explanation. “This was a multitude of honest mistakes,” he said.

Still Sorick said voters should be concerned and ask themselves which candidate is most capable of running the city.

“Voters should look closely at who has the best opportunity to serve the city residents, who has been doing the best job and doing it without asking for a dime in return,” he said.

He contrasted his campaign to George’s saying it’s more of grassroots effort with less focus on raising funds because with school district, county and city taxes people in the don’t have the money give.

“Mostly what I want is people’s time,” he said, adding it means more to him for someone to donate an hour of time than to write a check.

George’s campaign has undergone an organizational change since the discrepancies surfaced last month when an anonymous mailing was sent to the election bureau and the media.

Among the questionable entries was a $2,500 contribution incorrectly attributed to Robert Frankelli of Franchelli Enterprises in Wilkes-Barre. Frankelli said he gave $100. George said he confused the Frankelli contribution with one made by Robert Stella and deposited on the same day, April 24.

Ted Wampole, who joined the George campaign after serving as co-chairman for Democratic challenger George Brown, said an amended report has been filed with the election bureau. The Friends of Tony George hired Thomas Ostrowski, a certified public accountant with the Scranton firm of Eckersley &amp; Ostrowski, to review the reports and correct them.

“We feel we put the correct organizational changes in place so it doesn’t happen again,” Wampole said.

He said George was sloppy in his preparation of the reports and as a good leaders do, the candidate owned up to his mistakes.

County assistant solicitor Mike Butera said he will send a packet of documents, including George’s July 23 press explaining the discrepancies, to District Attorney Stefanie Salavantis to begin an investigation. “She’ll have it in her hands Monday,” Butera said.

It is unknown if the investigation will be completed before the Nov. 3 municipal election.
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By Jerry Lynott

jlynott@www.timesleader.com

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Reach Jerry Lynott at 570-991-6120 or on Twitter @TLNews

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George: Campaign finance mistakes expected to be issue in Wilkes-Barre mayor race