Indictment at odds with Ellis’ public face | www.myajc.com

As DeKalb County CEO Burrell Ellis went into campaign mode in November 2011, he had concerns: Months earlier, the county had passed a steep property tax hike. Commissioners were often siding against him. And there was growing talk about doing away with his job — by dumping DeKalb’s unique CEO-style of government.

Ellis, a buttoned-down Ivy Leaguer, had won his first term as CEO in 2008 portraying himself as the sober, steadying hand who would reform a troubled government. Now facing re-election and sitting on a pile of campaign cash, Candidate Ellis began in earnest an aggressive fundraising drive to keep himself in office another four years.

It was then, an indictment released last week alleges, that Ellis had the county’s purchasing and contracting director compile lists of companies getting contracts from the county so he could call them for campaign contributions.

Building a formidable war chest to scare off potential challengers and making campaign calls to contractors are business as usual in Georgia politics. In recent years, DeKalb politics has increasingly gotten sharp-edged but the indictment, pursued by DeKalb District Attorney Robert James, paints Ellis as a petty, venal politician using government workers as campaign staffers, shaking down vendors for campaign cash and then retaliating against those who wouldn’t cut checks.

via Indictment at odds with Ellis’ public face | www.myajc.com.