Sniff Sniff Sniff

Partisan or not; Michael Brodkorp has the reporter's nose. Check out the story so far:

(Brodkorp's) web site has questioned fund-raising and expenditures by the Lac qui Parle DFL in 2003. On his Web site and in an interview with the Independent on Tuesday, he suggested the figures show an abnormal spike that could be hiding a DFL slush fund.

Brodkorb . . . said county officials have given him the runaround and have offered at least two different explanations for the 2003 spike. In most years, Brodkorb says, the county DFL spends perhaps an average of $3,000, but spent more than $24,000 alone in 2003 for what was termed either “printing” expenses or lawn signs with a company called Poligraphics. “If you look at the expenditures in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005 and what they have spent in ’06, those ’03 numbers are off the charts,” he said.

The state’s records show many of the contributions to Lac qui Parle County in 2003 came from big donors outside of Lac qui Parle County: $3,000 from Twin Cities auto dealer Denny Hecker, another $4,500 combined from two other members of Hecker’s family, $5,000 from Pamala Deal of NAU Insurance of Anoka, $5,000 from Fingerhut owner Theodore Deikel of Minnetonka, $5,000 from leading state DFL activist Vance Opperman, and $5,000 from Samuel L. Koplin of Minneapolis, a leading fund-raiser for presidential candidate John Kerry.

Brodkorb says he’s gotten different explanations from county officials for the 2003 figures. He was told the money was used for either “printing” or for lawn signs for Mike Hatch, Aaron Peterson and (Sen. Gary) Kubly.

Kubly wasn’t up for re-election until 2006 and Hatch had not declared in 2003 whether he was running for governor in 2006. He said county DFL treasurer Allen Simonson couldn’t explain why $24,500 was spent at Poligraphics or who told him to authorize payment.

Keep watching folks, this is going somewhere.