In an email exchange with a Durango resident, City Manager Ron LeBlanc said all residents were welcome to attend a retirement party for former City Attorney David Smith even though the city failed to advertise the party and instead sent only private invitations.

Durango resident Barbara Dodds emailed the Durango City Council on May 20 to express her displeasure after the cost of the party was made public.

“I think use of taxpayer funds for a private party – regardless of who the party was for – was totally inappropriate and should not occur in the future,” Dodds wrote in an email.

The city of Durango spent $16,571 on Smith's retirement party April 12 at the DoubleTree Hotel. The money came from the city's general fund, which is fueled mostly by sales and use tax revenue.

Durango Mayor Sweetie Marbury asked LeBlanc to respond to Dodds' email. In his reply, LeBlanc said all residents were invited, but in a phone interview with The Durango Herald, he didn't know how the city made it clear to residents they were welcome. He also said in the interview he didn't know how the city decided to whom to send an invitation. LeBlanc partly blamed this newspaper in a May 23 email to Dodds.

“The Herald didn't do a very good job of getting this information out to the public,” LeBlanc wrote in the email.

The city sent about 810 invitations to the party, said Sherri Dugdale, assistant to the city manager. That's slightly less than 5 percent of the city's 17,216 residents, according to the 2012 U.S. Census Bureau numbers.

Dodds wanted more proof from LeBlanc about who could attend, saying blaming the newspaper “is a very poor excuse.”

“Actually, I can't imagine how everyone could have been invited to this party without providing an RSVP... ,” Dodds wrote back to LeBlanc in a May 27 email. “Please send me the notice inviting every city resident to this party so that I might be able to believe you.”

LeBlanc sent Dodds another email on May 28 saying he “misspoke and misunderstood (about) what actually happened.”

“The display ad that appeared in the newspaper was after the event took place, not before,” LeBlanc wrote in his second email.

The city paid more than $800 to place an advertisement in the Herald congratulating Smith on 37 years of service. Smith's retirement party was April 12, and the ad ran in the Herald on April 20. It made no mention of a party.

In an interview for this story, LeBlanc reiterated that everyone was welcome to attend Smith's retirement party.

“We wouldn't have turned anyone away at the door. We didn't check IDs,” he said.

Luis Toro, director of Colorado Ethics Watch, said he can't read LeBlanc's mind, so he can't say if his responses were ethical, but it's highly unlikely that someone who wasn't invited would know the party was happening.

“You can say that everyone was welcome, but everyone wasn't invited.” Toro said. “So to say everyone was welcome is not really a satisfying answer.”

Marbury said she is satisfied with LeBlanc's response to Dodds. She said he apologized for the initial response that everyone was invited, and she said she backs his statement that everyone was welcome.

“I saw people from all walks of life at that event,” Marbury said.

Dodds' last email to the city manager on June 1, copied to Marbury, thanked him for “a much more honest answer.”

The Herald asked Dugdale how the city determined to whom it would send an invitation. She said no city documentation about that exists. The law doesn't require the city to give information unless it is in a document that is considered “public” under the law.

If all Durango residents went to the party and ate, which cost $30 a person, the party could have cost more than $500,000.

“But that didn't happen, though, did it?” Marbury said. “Of the 800 invitations sent out, I think 350 showed up, so 500 people had something else to do that evening.”

Dodds said she reluctantly shared the email exchange with a Herald reporter, but Toro commended Dodds for her continued questioning of LeBlanc and bringing it to light.

“I think it's a good example of citizens holding the government accountable,” he said. “It's important not to accept explanations at face value and to push and dig, and that's what's been done here.”

Dodds' email to LeBlanc in June also said she felt lately more people think city officials are a little “out of touch” and “elitist.”

“I believe that trust in government is slowly being eroded at the local level,” Dodds said in a voicemail to a Herald reporter. “The spending of tax dollars for an event to which all taxpayers were not aware of and were all not invited to attend was an inappropriate use of taxpayer funds.”

smueller@durangoherald.com

An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported that The Durango Herald didn’t receive any information about David Smith's retirement party. At least seven Herald employees received an email from the city containing a meeting agenda for the City Council that listed the day and time of the party.