[img_assist|nid=1104|title=From abe21.net|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=275|height=172]Last week the Inside Edge got an email from someone out in Wally World with a link to the website abe21.net, which is smoking hot, but not in a good way.

While the site's slogan is "Bringing Elbert County into the 21st Century" it looks like they are using 19th Century web technology. We wouldn't be surprised if a coal-fired smokestack appeared on the backside of our computer when the site is up on our screen because the technology is so old.

Smoke, literally comes out of our mouse.

OK, not literally.

The site, which proclaims itself as not "totally partisan," is run, in part, by Robert Thomasson, a Democrat, who is running for the Board of County Commissioners in Elbert. He has many issues regarding how Elbert County is run by nasty Republicans that he discusses in detail on the site, but we were especially intrigued by the "How much is Elbert County attorney Mark Scheffel getting paid" issue.

We we're intrigued in part because Scheffel is running for Colorado Senate. And he's the former Chair of the Douglas County GOP.

And we like smoking guns in Senate races. We are all for those kind of gun rights.

Last week Thomasson, who is quite lathered up about the issue, held a contest in order to guess how much Scheffel made as Elbert County attorney.

It seems that Thomasson has made several records requests for the information and was dissatisfied when Elbert County just sent the invoices listed on three pieces of paper rather than list details. Thomasson, apparently, doesn't understand how to add up the figures. (But he wants to be your county commissioner, right?)

So we added up the invoices that he posted on his website for him.

According to the invoices, a little over $200,000 in a fifteen month period was paid to Reid and Scheffel and another firm Arnold and Associates. We assume that Scheffel has some relationship with either Arnold or Associates, otherwise Elbert County would not have sent those records.

So is $200k paid to Scheffel a smoking gun of corruption? Hmm.

"It's just a number," says one attorney who works with municipal clients. "It might be high, it might be low. There's no telling unless you look more closely at the bills."

When pressed, another attorney said: "Without saying it's a good deal, I will say that it's seems reasonable that [Elbert County] has those kinds of costs. There is a big debate in running cities and counties. Do you hire an in-house attorney and do it cheaper or bring in outside counsel that has less conflict of interest?"

How about Scheffel's alleged refusal to talk about the issue with Thomasson?

"Well, bills are privileged information between a client and an attorney," said one of our attorneys. "An attorney is not necessarily allowed to disclose that information."

Fair enough, but our recommendation to the Board of County Commissioners for Elbert County, or any other county (like Douglas County) that might get an open records request regarding Scheffel from, say an enterprising news site owned by the Observer Media Group, is to put out that fire fast.

Because when you see smoke, there's fire.

That fire could be from some dangerous dude or dudette on the internet who doesn't understand technology (kind of like us). Or it could be a grease fire from a backroom deal.

We will see.