Apr 18, 2007 3 min read

When you’re a public official, full disclosure doesn’t get any better than revealing what you’ve learned about a possible conflict at a televised public meeting, then relying on your solicitor’s advice to chart your next course of action. That’s exactly what Fayette County Housing Authority Chairwoman Angela M. Zimmerlink did back in July 2003, when she found out that her estranged father had become a FCHA Section 8 program landlord in August 2002. Our news story of that meeting read: “In another matter, Zimmerlink told the board that she recently became aware that her father has become a Section 8 Program landlord. As such, Zimmerlink said she plans to recuse herself from any votes involving that rental voucher program.

“(FHCA solicitor John M.) Purcell said that while it is not a legal requirement, Zimmerlink was free to take that position, which includes submitting her intentions in writing as well as verbally.”

Relying on Purcell’s legal opinion, Zimmerlink continued voting to approve the Section 8 Program landlord payment vouchers, a routine part of every meeting that covered approximately 900 landlords. Among them was Robert Keill, Zimmerlink’s father, in whose rental property Zimmerlink had zero financial interest.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development eventually investigated the link and in April 2005, nearly two years after Zimmerlink made it public, ruled that Keill could not be a Section 8 landlord due to a conflict of interest. Several other FCHA employees who had direct family ties to Section 8 were also part of that probe; only one of them, finance director Sonya Over – who like Zimmerlink had rocked the boat at the FCHA – was deemed by HUD to have a conflict, in Over’s case because her brother was a Section 8 landlord.

It’s important to note that under Section 8, the FCHA issues a housing voucher to an eligible tenant, who is then free to shop around and pick her or her own landlord. It’s not as though Keill or anyone else gets the voucher ahead of time and thus corners the market on Section 8 rentals.

And now, nearly two years after HUD issued its ruling that made Keill ineligible for Section 8, and nearly four years after Zimmerlink revealed the family tie, the Pennsylvania Ethics Commission finds that she committed “an unintentional/technical violation of the (ethics) act,” for which she agreed to pay $250.

Zimmerlink believes the ethics complaint against her, filed anonymously, was politically motivated and timed to coincide with next month’s election in which she’s seeking seeking to retain her seat as a Fayette County commissioner. We’d have to agree that the timing of the filing of the complaint appears to lend credence to that theory.