Al Schmidt explains his support for Clark

As Philadelphia City Commissioner Al Schmidt tells it, he walked into the commissioners' Jan. 6 reorganization meeting with two proposals written out in his leather-bound notebook.

One proposal was to nominate newcomer Lisa Deeley to chair the three-member commissioner board that oversees city elections.

The other was to renominate a man who had become known for his City Hall absences and having not voted in six elections: Commissioner Anthony Clark.

Schmidt went with the latter and, with Clark's acceptance of the chairman's $138,612 post, set off a firestorm.

On Monday, in a 90-minute interview, Schmidt said he did not regret his decision to renominate Clark as chairman.

Though he said criticisms of Clark's record were "certainly warranted," Schmidt said he did what he thought was best for the voters.

"I had thought a lot about the two options. They both came with advantages and disadvantages. Obviously we're seeing some of the disadvantages that come with the decision that I made," said Schmidt, the board's only Republican. "For me, the advantages outweighed all the other considerations, because it was about continuing to do good things and making sure good things weren't undone."

The "good things" that Schmidt, 44, touts as having improved in the 98-employee, $9.6 million election office include: creating a new City Commissioners website where voters can find their polling places, look up election-night results, and browse through candidates' campaign finance reports; issuing reports highlighting voting patterns and turnout; and creating and implementing departmental regulations that cut down on employee tardiness and absences.

Schmidt said he feared that Deeley, a Democrat, wouldn't give him autonomy to continue such work. He declined to elaborate, other than to say he didn't want to "risk" going with the "unknown."

Clark, too, is a Democrat, but he was the "known" who had supported Schmidt's pet projects. And as Schmidt has said before, he likes the "continuity" of keeping Clark chairman in a busy presidential election year.

Deeley declined to comment Monday except to say of Schmidt, "He's talking about reform and nominated him," as she pointed to Clark's office.

Schmidt said he had to choose between two people the Democrats chose for him to work with.

"In the end, because of concern about new leadership in a presidential election, and knowing that we would be able to continue to do good things together and getting those things done, I made the decision that I made to support Clark for chair," Schmidt said.

"I don't have any interest in defending anything that Anthony has done or not done," he said. "That's for Anthony to do."

Clark has blamed his missed votes on illness, and said he works from afar, staying in touch with the office by phone. On Monday, he was in the office but declined to comment for this article.

Since Clark's reelection as chairman, Mayor Kenney has called his work habits "insulting" to hardworking city employees, and the city's Democratic party chairman, U.S. Rep. Robert Brady, has called him a "disgrace." On Friday, the civic group Committee of Seventy cited Clark's record in urging City Council to replace the elected commissioners with appointed professionals. Elections are "too important to be left in the hands of a comfortable and corrupt political process," the group said.

Schmidt promptly rebuffed the group's call, saying any appointee would be a political appointee. And on Friday, he hauled out records showing that the Committee of Seventy's executive director, David Thornburgh, and its former director, Zack Stalberg, had - like Clark - not voted in some recent elections.

Schmidt said Monday that the watchdog group's "self-righteousness got to be too much to take."

"Their criticisms of Anthony were certainly warranted, but as an election watchdog group, I guess, I had higher expectations for them . . . in practicing what they preach," Schmidt said.

Schmidt has voted in every election in the last decade, records show.

A Pittsburgh native who worked for several years in Washington for the U.S. Government Accountability Office, Schmidt moved here in 2005 to marry a Philadelphia woman. He worked for the city and state GOPs, ran for city controller, and won his current post in 2011 by running as a reformer and unseating fellow Republican Joseph Duda.

He clashed with another self-styled reformer then on the board, Democrat Stephanie Singer, and in 2012, Schmidt and Clark named themselves cochairs, then reorganized with Clark as chairman and Schmidt as vice-chair.

Schmidt soon emerged as de facto chairman. It was an unlikely partnership - Schmidt, a data-savvy GOP government accountability specialist, and Clark, a longtime Democratic ward leader whose office contains no computer.

The chairman is paid $9,239 more than the other two commissioners, ostensibly for a larger administrative role. But Schmidt's office, with Clark's acquiescence, has been handling much of that work.

After he was reelected chairman this month, Clark drew further criticism by swiftly signing up for a lump-sum DROP pension payout worth $495,000 when he retires. Schmidt - who has said he is opposed to any elected official's taking DROP benefits - pointed out that if the Committee of Seventy had its way and an appointee ran the office, that person would be eligible for DROP: Only newly elected officials are banned from the controversial perk.

Like Clark, Schmidt said part of his own work is contact with the public: "You want to make sure constituent calls are answered and responded to. . . . We also do a lot of outreach. I go to speak to seniors in high school, who are just becoming of voter age. I go to speak to seniors at assisted-care facilities."

Schmidt disputes any notion Clark's behavior has taxpayers' blood boiling.

"I see it on the front page of the newspaper, so it's not like it's not a big deal, but on the ground, I'm not sensing the same thing," Schmidt said. "We had our public meeting the other day - [there] was no outrage present."

Indeed, the "public" at that meeting consisted of a reporter and a representative of the Committee of Seventy.

"I made the decision I made for the reasons that I made it, regardless of what blowback there could possibly be," Schmidt said. "I'm determined to make the right decision for what's best for the department and the voters."

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