The state Ethics Commission is moving ahead with an ethics complaint against Providence City Council President Luis Aponte.
The commission on Tuesday found probable cause for the complaint to go to an administrative trial. A settlement is also a possibility.
A Providence citizen filed the complaint against Aponte for backing a zoning change last year that benefited the person who was Aponte’s landlord at the time. Aponte has previously said he was not aware that the change would help the landlord.
An investigative report prepared for the commission found that many city officials knew that Keith Fernandes, head of the Providence Apartment Association, was Aponte’s landlord at the time of the vote.
“I did not violate the ethics standard, and I look forward to vigorously defending myself in due process against this allegation,” Aponte said in a statement released through the City Council office. He has served on the council since 1999 and became council president in 2015.
Aponte also faces a referral of a case by the state Board of Elections to the attorney general’s office. As WPRI.com has reported, Aponte borrowed thousands of dollars from his campaign account and his ex-wife to pay back his campaign account more than $15,000 in personal or unexplained expenditures.
Amy Kempe, spokeswoman for Attorney General Peter Kilmartin, says the matter involving Aponte remains under investigation. Speaking during a RIPR interview in December, Aponte said he had not yet been contacted by the AG’s office.
In related news, the Ethics Commission approved a settlement over a revolving door complaint with former state rep Don Lally.
Lally will pay a $5,000 fine, while agreeing that he violated the Code of Ethics by taking a job in the governor’s office within a year of leaving the legislature. The former Democratic rep from Narragansett no longer works for the state.
This post has been updated.
