Oregon Government Ethics Commission members and staff listen Friday to Lincoln County District Attorney Jenna Wallace defend herself against a complaint by county human resources director David Collier. (OGEC meeting livestream)By SHAYLA ESCUDERO/Lincoln Chronicle
Lincoln County District Attorney Jenna Wallace may have broken several state ethics laws when she advocated for her husband and assigned him work when he was a county employee, according to a review by the Oregon Government Ethics Commission staff.
The commission voted unanimously last week to approve a full investigation into Wallace’s actions, but expressed some frustration with the timing of the complaint sent March 3 by the county’s human resources director. Most of the allegations took place two years ago, Orrin Wallace was dismissed from his post a year ago and is still part of a $3.3 million wrongful dismissal lawsuit against the county.
Orrin Wallace is now a police officer in Toledo.
The county contracted with attorney David J. Elkanich of Portland to compile information for the complaint – an eight-page letter and 70 pages of supporting documents – and he sent it to the ethics commission on behalf of human resources director David Collier.
That complaint came six months after the commission voted to also fully investigate a complaint by Commissioner Casey Miller on how Collier was having commissioners privately voting to grant exceptions to a 2025 hiring freeze. The ethics commission has yet to make a decision on that investigation.
While the agency’s staff preliminary review found “substantial objective basis” to believe Wallace may have violated ethics laws, no formal violations would be determined until after the investigation process.
The relationship between county commissioners, Jenna Wallace, county counsel Kristin Yuille and Collier have been strained over years with their contentions stemming from this exact issue – Wallace’s efforts to employ her husband as a detective in her office.
Former district attorney Lanee Danford hired Jenna Wallace in March 2022 as a deputy district attorney and then also hired Orrin Wallace in August 2023 to fill a detective position. Danforth later resigned rather than seek re-election and Jenna Wallace won the May 2024 primary race and was appointed by Gov. Tina Kotek as the district attorney months later. She declared a conflict of interest and said other staff would oversee her husband’s work.
Preliminary review
Collier’s complaint alleged Wallace repeatedly violated ethics laws by being involved in “personnel decisions, supervision, and advocacy affecting her husband’s employment compensation, job duties and eligibility for a certified law enforcement position.”
WallaceIn late 2024 Orrin Wallace was going to be moved to a legal assistant position that paid $14 less an hour than what he was receiving as a detective. Jenna Wallace advocated that her husband or another eligible employee take a digital forensic detective position that had not yet been created.
While the ethics commission’s preliminary review found the position was not solely created for Wallace’s husband and that the work to add that position had begun under Danforth, her actions still raised concerns over nepotism.
Wallace knew her husband was getting demoted from his position and was making decisions that could directly impact his finances, according to the review.
When Wallace was first appointed as district attorney she reached out to the ethics commission for advice and developed a nepotism policy. An ethics commission investigator said while Wallace put a blanket statement on her website announcing her conflict of interest, there were several instances where that statement wouldn’t suffice and that she should have disclosed her conflict of interest in the moment because she was involved in decisions that could have been positively or negatively affected her husband financially.
Orrin WallaceInvestigators also found that Wallace assigned her husband work often in emails after hours, and that the commission would need to review those assignments if they resulted in overtime pay or other types of compensation.
“It appears Jenna Wallace did not consistently adhere to the nepotism policy she had developed,” the review stated. “Whether that was because she was prohibited from doing so by other County officials or because she ignored her own directives is a question for the investigation phase.”
Investigating
While members of the ethics commission voted unanimously Friday to investigate whether Wallace had broken ethics laws – there was also some frustration.
“The timing of the complaint was slightly odd, only because my husband has not been employed in my office for about a year. He’s employed elsewhere now,” Wallace told commissioners Friday. “I really wish this had been filed while he was in my office, so that I could have been educated about what I was doing wrong, I could have implemented changes and avoided any issues. However, I will say that it feels a little bit like small town politics are using OGEC in that kind of weaponized way for their own agenda.”
Other than to acknowledge that it had received a complaint against Wallace, ethics commission staff could not comment on it until after the commission voted Friday whether to open a full inquiry.
But the complaint was passed between Lincoln County staff, lawyers and members of the public. Collier’s complaint was then used by Depoe Bay resident Monica Kirk to file a complaint against Wallace with the Oregon State Bar, which was publicized in a news release by Eliot Sekular, a member of the publicity committee of Lincoln County Democrats.
Because Wallace had reached out to the commission seeking guidance multiple times, she likely would receive a letter of education, according to commission staff. While the intent did not matter when determining if an ethics law was broken, it did play a role in what penalties were determined.
“I am beyond disappointed at the people bringing this forward, that they would file a complaint and issue a press release about it,” said commission vice chair Jonathan Thompson.“There is absolutely nothing in this process that gets me more mad than the obvious use of the commission as a political weapon … so I’ll make a motion to move it forward, but I make it reluctantly.”
- Shayla Escudero is an enterprise reporter for the Lincoln Chronicle covering local governments, education, housing and social services and can be reached at [email protected]
It’s about time. Wallace’s nonsense went on far too long. Let’s hope the bar association takes action too.
And what about Lanee Danforth? We’ve never really found out why she resigned. Her Oregon law license also became inactive. So it sure smells like the bar association was about to take action against her for her ethical problems: https://share.google/Iwo3yDlhPEXH8QJTm
All this commotion about the county commission and the legal council and DA’s feels like a subversive action of the Lincoln County Democrats trying to take over the county offices. This is why it is so important to elect independent thinks to the commission this fall and not the Democrat nominees. Let’s depoliticize Lincoln County.
The OGEC vote to investigate District Attorney Jenna Wallace contains what I believe is an error that deserves correction, and the DA’s characterization of this matter as “small town politics” deserves a response. Commissioner Thompson stated that the complainants publicized the complaint. That is not accurate. I did in a press release about an ethics complaint I filed on April 19, 2026, against DA Wallace with the Oregon State Bar. The investigation will clarify this for him.
I asked my friend, Eliot Sekuler, to write a press release for the ethics complaint I filed with the Bar because of his experience with public communications — not in his capacity with the Lincoln County Democrats, and not at the direction of that organization. The Lincoln County Democrats had no involvement in my complaint.
It was Orrin Wallace’s lawsuit against the county for $3.3 million that got not only my attention, but that of other attorneys who were concerned about the allegations Orrin made in his complaint about his work as a detective, a position for which he did not have the required DPSST certification, and the extent to which DA Wallace supervised him. When I later learned of the OGEC complaint filed by HR Director Collier, I asked local attorneys whether any had filed a Bar complaint. Every one of them was troubled by what was happening — but none had acted, understandably concerned about their livelihoods. So I did. As a retired attorney, I had less to lose.
The most damning allegation for me was not included in the OGEC complaint. It was that DA Wallace had lied on a state form about her husband’s DPSST Certification, which was required for a detective. This is the centerpiece of my ethics complaint.
DA Wallace suggests that the OGEC complaint is politically motivated. It is not. I first raised ethics concerns directly with DA Wallace and her husband, Orrin Wallace, at a campaign event, well before any complaint was filed. I told them plainly that having Orrin work in her office raised at a minimum an appearance-of-conflict problem under the Oregon ethics statutes. We also talked about the Bar’s disciplinary rules. She assured me she was taking steps to address it.
Oregon’s ethics laws apply to all public officials. DA Wallace has been a licensed Oregon attorney, subject to both the Oregon ethics law, Chapter 240 (and the Oregon State Bar Rules of Professional Conduct) since 2015. The OGEC staff found a substantial objective basis to believe ethics laws were violated and recommended an investigation. It had nothing to do with politics. The commission voted unanimously to proceed.
Lincoln County residents need to vote for new blood in most positions of the county. This county has so much bickering and dysfunction in many areas and it continues to get worse. We truly need leaders that are more mature and dedicated to perform their duties ethically and enforce the laws. What happened to working for the people? There’s so much infighting that the focus has been taken off of what really matters, which is obeying the laws, improving our county, and helping the residents who voted for them. Lincoln County needs to get it together and quit this nonsense. Let’s bring respect to our beautiful coastal county so we can be proud of living here. It’s overdue.