Heath Abshure, commissioner of the Arkansas Securities Department, did not include on his annual “statement of financial interest” for 2012 any travel reimbursements he received while he was on the board and serving as president of a nonprofit national securities organization.
The document is filed each year with the Arkansas Ethics Commission by state government officials.
In 2012, Abshure was on the board of the North American Securities Administrators Association, a nonprofit organization whose membership consists of securities administrators in 50 states and various North American countries. He also served as president of the association from September 2012 until October 2013.
On his 2012 statement, Abshure wrote “N/A” (not applicable) on Section 10 of the filing, which asks for nongovernmental sources of income.
On Section 10, government officials are asked to “list each nongovernmental source of payment of your expenses for food, lodging or travel which bears a relationship to your office when you appear in your official capacity when the expenses incurred exceed $150.”
After an initial question about his answer on the 2012 document, Abshure said he didn’t think it was necessary to include trips for the national organization on the filing.
“If it is, I made a mistake,”he said.
Later, Abshure said, “Now I’m not sure if I was supposed to [include the reimbursements] or not.”
“I worry if I try to come up with my own analysis of what I should have filed, I’m putting myself at risk,” Abshure said. “I would rather just talk with the Ethics Commission about it. If it is determined that I was supposed to, I’m just going to have to own up to it. Because I sure didn’t.”
He hopes to speak with the Ethics Commission later this week, and he will ask what he should do, Abshure said.
Abshure does not have to file his 2013 statement of financial interest until the end of this month.
If he discovers that he should have included the reimbursements on previous statements, he could file an amended statement, Abshure said.
Abshure acknowledged that he took numerous trips in 2011, 2012 and 2013 on behalf of the national association. Those included a trip to Washington, D.C., in 2011 when he testified before a subcommittee of Congress; a trip to discuss the Jobs Act signing at the White House in 2012; and many trips in 2013 when he was president of the association, Abshure said. He said he made probably 15-20 trips in 2012 and more than that in 2013.
The directors of two other state agencies said Tuesday that they considered it a requirement to include travel reimbursements that they receive each year from outside groups on their annual statements of financial interest.
Graham Sloan, director of the Ethics Commission, said people have filed amended statements in the past.
It is “hard to handicap” how serious it is to omit the reimbursements on a statement of financial interest, Sloan said.
The commission has the authority to issue three levels of public letters - a caution, a warning or a reprimand, Sloan said. It also can issue fines ranging from $50 to $2,000, Sloan said.
Abshure will be questioned today by the legislative Joint Performance Review Committee about his recommendation to three investment companies that they donate more than $170,000 combined to the North American Securities Administrators Association.
The largest donation of $150,000 was paid by Little Rock-based Crews & Associates.
One member of the committee has sent a Freedom of Information Act request to Abshure asking for records of expenses incurred by Abshure and his staff that were reimbursed by the national securities organization, Abshure said.
In November, Little Rock based Stephens Inc. filed a complaint with the Ethics Commission against Abshure, claiming that the Securities Department had signed “three illegal consent orders” in which Abshure accepted charitable contributions to “the commissioner’s chosen charities” in lieu of fines.
Business, Pages 23 on 01/22/2014