Utah Democrats no longer paying party leader due to funding shortfall

Utah Democrats this week said they will no longer pay their state party leader due to a lack of funding.

The Salt Lake Tribune reported that the state’s Democratic Party executive committee voted Tuesday to stop paying Chairwoman Daisy Thomas for the rest of her term. Thomas is one of three people on the state party’s payroll.

“Changes just have to be made to make sure the organization remains viable,” Sheila Srivastava, the party’s treasurer, told The Salt Lake Tribune.

{mosads}The party reportedly learned it did not have adequate funds when Executive Director Alex Cragun realized he did not receive a portion of his paycheck.

“We have plans to reimburse him completely for any shortfall. The Utah Democratic Party is a worker’s party and we believe all our full-time employees are entitled to a living wage,” Thomas said.

A GoFundMe campaign has since been created to raise money to pay Cragun for his already-missed wages.

“He genuinely cares about people — now to the point of not even getting paid for the work he has done. This is a problem. Without a healthy Alex, there is no healthy infrastructure for the community we all want to build. Invest in Alex, so he can invest in himself. If his job can’t pay, we can keep him afloat until he can find one that can,” the GoFundMe page reads.

Srivastava, who began her role in February, said the group previously did not have good practices in place for accounting. She said she has spent the past few months attempting to “clean up” the party’s financial reporting system.

The Utah Democratic Party did not immediately respond to a request for comment.