When we spied a fire truck driving down Georgia Avenue on Saturday morning with a banner promoting Muriel Bowser, we were confused. After all, Bowser is a candidate in the coming special election for Ward 4, and last we checked, city vehicles are stricly off-limits for campaign purposes. Well, we weren’t the only ones miffed by the emergency vehicle’s use as a campaign tool. From yesterday’s installment of themail, D.C. Watch’s bi-weekly online newsletter:

On Saturday, April 20, at 10:50 a.m., I pulled over to the side of 14th Street because a fire truck with sirens was going northbound on 14th Street. As it neared, I saw the firefighters waving, and as it passed I saw there was a banner on the side of the truck promoting Muriel Bowser for city council. The DC Fire Department and Ms. Bowser need to explain to the citizens whether city property is being used to promote partisan candidates. If so, the Fire Department needs to take action to prevent future uses of DC property for partisan campaigning and to punish the perpetrators. Ms. Bowser needs to explain why her campaign is needlessly raising alarms in the community to promote her candidacy. It seems unlikely that it is legal for emergency vehicles to use sirens when there is no emergency; using sirens unnecessarily diminishes drivers’ sense of urgency when they hear the real thing…

…The emergency vehicle, equipped with campaign banners, T-shirted campaign staffers, and firemen was seen, at times, moving slowly along DC streets with flashing lights and sirens blaring as Ms. Bowser and others waved to onlookers. This is not only a clear violation of campaign rules and law, but also a violation of fire department rules, procedures, and professionalism. However, in my mind, there are more serious issues of accountability, unfettered access, taxpayer waste, and inefficiency that when closely examined could rise to the level of a misdemeanor criminal act. Depending on Ms. Bowser’s culpability in acquiring this taxpayer-purchased emergency vehicle as well as her being an accessory both before and after the fact, it incenses me to think that any ordinary person could commandeer a government vehicle and use it for her personal campaign use.

Just to be sure, we put in a quick call to the D.C. Office of Campaign Finance. This is roughly how that conversation went:

DCist: Is it legal to use city vehicles for campaign purposes?
OCF: You’re kidding, right?
DCist: No, totally serious. We saw a fire truck bearing a Muriel Bowser banner.
OCF: Good God, no!

So that settles it. Either Bowser or those firemen have some explaining to do. (We had another interesting run-in with firemen bending the law last year.) But regardless of who’s to blame, did they really not think anyone would notice? After all, it was a fire truck! With sirens and lights! And a banner with Bowser’s name on it!