As Shawnee mayor grapples with criminal charge, stark political divide lingers in city
On May 17, just days after Shawnee Mayor Michelle Distler cast a tie-breaking vote to give city manager Nolan Sunderman a raise, she got an email from a mainstay at City Hall who had long been one of her supporters.
“I am thoroughly and totally disgusted with the vote and your breaking the tie,” Ray Erlichman wrote. “IMHO you have now completely forgotten the people who have supported you in the past.”
The riposte was one of several acerbic emails obtained by The Star that were sent to Distler over the last year by Erlichman, better known among those who follow suburban politics as Shawnee Ray, a garrulous New Yorker-turned-Shawnee-resident who sells nuts and bolts and runs a pugnacious blog on City Hall happenings.
Erlichman’s split with Distler, after previously having written glowingly about her on his blog, reflects a wider chasm over the last year between a conservative faction of Shawnee City Hall watchers and the mayor. Once supportive of Distler, the conservatives more recently grew dissatisfied with her because of her positions on issues like a nondiscrimination ordinance, or her refusal to cast a vote to appoint as council president a more conservative member of the Shawnee City Council.
Erlichman and some of the others who make up the city’s more conservative faction are now witnesses in a felony perjury charge against the second-term mayor. Distler is accused of putting someone else’s name — it’s widely believed to be Erlichman’s — on a complaint to the Kansas attorney general against some of her council colleagues for violating the Kansas Open Meetings Act.
It’s one of the odder political scandals in recent Johnson County history. And while Distler and the law enforcement agencies involved remain tight-lipped about the case, other unusual details are emerging.
For example, multiple sources said that Distler’s door was damaged as authorities executed a search warrant at her home during an investigation of a crime involving an iPad, which Distler is said to have used to submit the complaint.
Against the backdrop of Distler’s criminal charge and the uncertainty of whether her career in public office can survive this scandal is a political reality in this suburb of 65,000: Longtime Shawnee figures say a combative civic atmosphere more typical in federal politics has taken root at City Hall, fostering a divide that is incongruous with the usual city affairs of picking up trash, paving roads and maintaining parks.
“There are some who are new and some who have served long-term who are very conservative and have an opinion that the less government, the better,” said Stephanie Meyer, a former councilwoman and mayoral aspirant. “If you take that perspective into local government, you get the product that we’ve seen.”
The matter has cast a pall on Shawnee.
“I look at Lenexa, I look at Olathe and Overland Park and Leawood and even Merriam making (stuff) happen, getting things done, growing businesses and apartments and all this other stuff,” said former Shawnee council member Jeff Vaught. “And you look at Shawnee and you can’t get (stuff) done.”
National politics in local affairs
The fractured, partisan style of national politics has been seeping into Shawnee’s affairs for some time.
In 2013, for example, the former local news outlet the Shawnee Dispatch reported that the number of conservatives on the council had grown. Though Shawnee municipal elections are nonpartisan, the Northwest Johnson County Republicans had sponsored an election night watch party.
The outlet reported that the political action committee had endorsed four City Council candidates, including Councilman Mike Kemmling and Distler, who was a councilwoman at the time. All of them but Distler, who ran unopposed, attended the event, according to the Dispatch.
More recently, an election last year that put Tammy Thomas and Kurt Knappen on the council resulted in a 4-4 ideological split on votes that could be described as social or political issues.
“When I first got on the council it was pretty much a 6-2 slam dunk, and I was on the losing end of that on a regular basis,” said Councilman Eric Jenkins, who was named on the witness list in Distler’s perjury case. “I think it’s interesting that we’ve been able to add a couple of conservatives on the council. I would suggest not only fiscal conservatives, but there are social conservatives in that foursome as well. That puts us almost directly at odds with the progressives.”
The Northwest Johnson County Republicans are a source of influence on the more conservative faction in Shawnee.
Vaught, the former council member, is critical of the group’s influence at City Hall.
“They want to bring partisan politics to local government and that just doesn’t work,” Vaught said. “I grew up Republican, I waved the flag for years. I’m unaffiliated now. I sit back and look at conservatives now and think, what do you stand for?”
Meyer said they are aggressive.
“They’ve really become, frankly, bullies in my viewpoint,” Meyer said. “And for whatever reason they’re getting disproportionate influence over some of the governing body.”
Tony Gillette, chairman of the Northwest Johnson County Republicans, brushed off the criticism.
“They used the word bullies?” he said.
Gillette said the group, which has between 50 and 60 paying members, is involved in grassroots organizing and supporting candidates who share “traditional constitutionalism, limited government and free and unlimited economic opportunity.”
“I don’t consider that bullying, I consider that your American right,” Gillette said.
Distler, who once held the group’s esteem, has over the years been increasingly at odds with it.
Gillette said Distler had been distancing herself from the group since 2018.
“We thought when we had four conservatives on the council, we thought Michelle would vote that way,” said Tracy Thomas, a former Shawnee City Council member whose views are generally conservative. “Michelle refuses to lead.”
That distance might have grown the evening of Aug. 26, 2019, when the Shawnee City Council took up an ordinance forbidding discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Some other Johnson County cities adopted similar measures enthusiastically, while others struggled over whether to approve one. But the issue at hand reflected the type of social political issues that municipalities increasingly are considering.
“Across the country, things have been more divisive lately. And people are entrenched in their views and not willing to compromise as they might have been in the past,” said Shawnee City Council member Jill Chalfie. “I would say that anything happening at the local level is just a trickle down effect from what is happening nationally.”
Gillette gave a presentation about the nondiscrimination ordinance at the Aug. 26, 2019, meeting.
He implored the council to reject the measure, claiming it was an attempt to solve a problem that didn’t exist and could result in litigation against the city. Gillette made another claim about the ordinance’s effect:
“If you were to move forward on this NDO, how will you protect the little girls from sexual predators who will be granted access to public accommodations, locker rooms and showers that correspond to their subjective gender identity, rather than their objective biological sex, and be given the ability to stalk their victims?” Gillette asked.
Gillette’s comments were the first among a stream of divided Shawnee residents who showed up that night to voice their opinions on the ordinance.
The measure passed 5-2, with council members Kemmling and Jenkins voting against.
Distler didn’t vote, but signaled her approval of what the council passed.
The vote rankled conservatives who follow Shawnee politics.
Mike Egan, an Ozarks resident who used to live in Shawnee and still follows city matters, sent Distler an email on Oct. 1, 2019, copied with two dozen other conservative activists, criticizing her for not vetoing the non-discrimination ordinance.
Egan, who did not respond to a request for comment for this story, is a witness in the case against Distler and a frequent guest in her email inbox with emails that often include other witnesses.
“My understanding is he is emailing her on a more than daily basis, going after her,” Vaught said. “It’s completely badgering her.”
An impasse
Shortly after three new members were sworn in at the start of this year, the Shawnee City Council already reached an impasse.
The council was tasked with appointing the new council president, a routine step each year that determines who would take over as acting mayor if the mayor were to be absent or step down. One council president was proposed, but the motion failed with a 4-4 tie. Another was suggested, and again, the council was deadlocked.
Distler refused to break the tie, although it was within her authority. She postponed the vote, and after hours-long meetings, officials decided it would be better to rework the rules for appointing council president.
Earlier this month, as the council worked to appoint the president for 2021, members remained divided in the same evenly split groups. But thanks to the new rules, the tie was broken with a coin toss this time around, and Councilwoman Lindsey Constance was appointed. That was the last resort after Distler, once again, declined to cast the deciding vote.
Distler’s refusal to choose a council president upset some in the community, including Jenkins, who argued that she should have made her position clear.
“I would like to see the mayor be a little more aggressive and vote. I don’t like the sort of mayor who ducks and covers,” Jenkins said. “She’s elected by the people to represent them, too, and I think the mayor should break the tie.
“We decided who’s going to potentially be the mayor of Shawnee by a coin flip. If (Distler is) forced to resign, that’d make Lindsey Constance mayor. That makes it even more important for (Distler) to weigh in on who is council president.”
Those who know Distler say her propensity to avoid conflict is a political handicap for her, particularly on close votes, although she has been willing to break other tie votes, such as with the city manager’s raise.
“She doesn’t like to be divisive on anything, kind of that utopian, ‘I want to make everyone happy,’” Vaught said. “It’s just not possible.”
Others don’t see as much of a problem with the council’s political dynamic.
“To me it’s normal that at some point, you’re going to coalesce into groups that are going to be similar in the way they process information,” Jenkins said. “Right now, we’ve formed a 4-4 group. Do I find that a problem? Not so much. If we disagree, let the chips fall where they may.”
Open meetings violations
Distler’s perjury charge is the latest in a string of incidents tied to problems Shawnee has with open and transparent government.
In 2013, District Attorney Steve Howe determined that the City Council violated the spirit of the Kansas Open Meetings Act when “backroom deals” were made to elect the then-mayor’s uncle to a council seat, The Star reported at the time.
And allegations of secret meetings and email chains with groups of council members have floated around each year, Meyer said. It’s one consequence of a fractured governing body, some argued.
“The KOMA complaint issue is something that predates myself on the council,” she said. “If memory serves me, every time someone is appointed to the council, there’s concern about a KOMA violation. Most times when we consider who the council president will be, there are allegations about a KOMA violation. It’s rather routine to hear these sorts of things.”
Tracy Thomas, the former councilwoman, has emailed the council several times this past year, alleging that there may be violations of the open meetings law. In a series of emails that a Star reporter was included on over several months, Thomas accuses the mayor and council of violating KOMA without providing much detail or proof to her allegations.
But some told The Star that they believe there may be validity to the KOMA complaint allegedly filed by Distler. They question whether the divide on the council has led to communication out of the public’s sight.
And Meyer said that she hopes it will be taken seriously, regardless of how it was submitted.
“I would hope that there would be a conversation about the substance of the KOMA violation complaint. If there was a violation, I think the citizens of Shawnee would benefit from knowing what’s going on there,” she said.
Jenkins doubts that the email string constituted a KOMA violation.
“If it’s the email I think it might be, then (Distler) was probably upset because there was some stuff that would have made any person upset. There was some stuff that was really out of line, it was out of step. Many of us didn’t like it. And unfortunately it sounds like she handled it poorly.”
The email in question, according to several people, took potshots at Distler.
“I believe some of the comments were personal and negative things about her. Not appropriate stuff, if it’s what I’m thinking of. But they have not shown me the exact email,” Jenkins said.
Jenkins said he doesn’t think Distler needs to step down. But some worry the ongoing perjury case, plus underlying politics at play, is leaving a dark mark on their city that they’ve so long worked to improve.
“I’m not calling on her to resign,” Jenkins said. “She’ll do what she needs to do. Does it impede her? I think it impedes her some. I think it might have affected her decision not to break the tie on council president perhaps. Does it affect your decisions? It may. But most of city business won’t be impacted at all.”
This story was originally published December 21, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
